AllMovie

By some inexplicable miracle, the eleven troubled inner-city black youths in this documentary were enabled to spend ten weeks on a working kibbutz in Israel. For those unfamiliar with what a kibbutz is, it is a communal living arrangement whose motto might be that of the Three Musketeers: "All for one, and one for all." At first, these five girls and six boys had difficulty with the long hours and hard work that was commonplace on the communally run factory and farm, but eventually the profound egalitarianism and cooperative spirit won them over. Likewise, the kibbutz dwellers were apprehensive of the kids at first, envisioning violent drug-obsessed malcontents. Instead, the freshness and enthusiasm of the youngsters won them over. Sadly, things were not so benign for the youths when their sojourn was over and they had to return to the hard streets of Brooklyn.