5 Broken Cameras

Arriving on DVD with the imprimatur of an Oscar nomination, 5 Broken Cameras is a world away from the glamour of the Academy Awards red carpet. Drawing on hundreds of hours of footage shot by Palestinian activist and amateur cameraman Emad Burnat, the film records the grinding struggle by his friends and neighbours to turn back encroachments onto their land by Jewish settlers, whose vast condominiums loom menacingly on the hill above their village.

The rough and ready camerawork reflects the chaos of improvised protests held in the face of often trigger-happy Israeli soldiers. As the conflict intensifies, so does the violence filmed by Burnat, but we also begin to realise the seemingly ramshackle structure of the film has drawn us in for a series of heartstopping events. Burnat's is necessarily a partial view, but this documentary remains a vital record of the way the lives of a whole generation have been warped and distorted by life on the front line. [Keir Roper-Caldbeck]