WestEnd Films, the company run by Israelis Sharon Harel-Cohen and Maya Amsellem, has purchased the international rights to Dismissed, the new darkly funny Israeli TV series about a group of young women soldiers, known as HaMifakedet in Hebrew.
Israeli Television Academy award winner Nir Berger (Dead End) and Atara Frish (Heroine), created the series and Frish is also the director. Naomi Levari (One Week and a Day) and Saar Yogev (Chained) produced it for Black Sheep Film Productions and Kan, the Israeli public broadcaster. KAN 11 is broadcasting the much buzzed-about series in Israel.
Dismissed is about Noa (Alona Saar), an awkward IDF soldier. Although Noa’s superiors consider her unfit to be a commander, through a series of circumstances that will not seem implausible to anyone who has had any experience of military bureaucracy, she is assigned to lead a platoon composed of a troubled group of recruits who refuse to accept her authority.
This is not the first time that female Israeli soldiers have been front and center in a drama that has gone around the world. In 2014, Talya Lavie’s Zero Motivation, the story of two women soldiers who are unhappily stuck on a remote base, won the top prize at the Tribeca Film Festival and was shown all over the world. The recent series Sisters also had a character who was a female soldier, as did the series Combat Medics (remade in the US as 68 Whiskey).
WestEnd will be in charge of sales through its WeSeries division. The company’s series credits include Valley of Tears, the drama about the Yom Kippur War, which recently streamed on HBO Max, and Traitor, which is now in post-production. Both series come from writers/producers Ron Leshem (Euphoria) and Amit Cohen (False Flag). WestEnd is also developing a female-driven thriller series from Leshem and Cohen.
“While Dismissed could be described as a dramedy series about female commanders in army basic training, it would probably be better described as a chick flick in the IDF. Yes, our heroines have to carry a rifle and crawl in the dirt, but their issues are very much those which any young woman has to face: social hierarchies, sexual identity, friendship, ambition, and of course the occasional Iranian drone infiltration,” said creators Berger and Frish.
“We’re thrilled to represent Dismissed and work with veteran producers Saar Yogev and Naomi Levari. Creators Atara Frish and Nir Berger have managed to create a fresh and smart show touching upon most social issues the younger generation is dealing with, and with the help of a fantastic cast have managed to do so with humor and sensitivity that will resonate with audiences worldwide. We are also thrilled to continue our relationship with KAN, which has been home of the best of Israeli TV in the last couple of years,” said Amsellem, managing director at WestEnd Films.