Alan Kaufman’s Match­es is a live tes­ti­mo­ny straight from the bat­tle­field of the ongo­ing con­flict in Israel. This bru­tal­ly real­is­tic tale is told by an Amer­i­can, Nathan Falk, who for var­i­ous ide­o­log­i­cal and qua­si-emo­tion­al rea­sons decides to leave his home­land and serve along­side his fel­low Jews in the IDF. 

Falk accounts for his new­ly acquired life in a rather episod­ic man­ner as he sur­veys an array of cul­tur­al­ly bound as well as polit­i­cal­ly charged inci­dents. Whether he is wit­ness­ing the lev­el­ing of an Arab terrorist’s house in Gaza, engag­ing in an affair with the wife of a friend or kick­ing back with a group of Jerusalem artists, Falk is quite the self-con­scious, at times self-inflict­ing, soul searcher. 

Hav­ing put him­self in such a set­ting, Falk inevitably finds him­self weighed down by moral quan­daries that lead him to make harsh judg­ments and hold extreme polit­i­cal views. 

For­tu­nate­ly, Kauf­man man­ages to skill­ful­ly por­tray the slight nuances of his character’s tem­pera­ment by bal­anc­ing Falk’s bru­tal vul­gar­i­ty with his occa­sion­al poet­ic sensitivity.