Jewish Movie Review: Fill the Void

With what excitement I was waiting for years to watch Fill the Void, directed by the Israeli-based Orthodox film director Rama Burshtein. The movie, set in the Orthodox community of the un-orthodox city of Tel Aviv, won several Israeli Academy Awards and the main actress, Hadas Yaron, who also played in Shtisel, among other roles, won Best Actress at the Venice Film Festival.

Personally, I am very cross about this movie. 

First and foremost, there are so many aspects I´ve loved about the movie. The game of the actors is natural, non-affected, their scripts are simple yet tensed by the weight of the choices they have to make and the responsibilities they have. There is not a ´we´ - the religious - against ´them´ - the non-religious - narrative although at least in one moment, during the Purim festival, when the old rabbi wants to learn Torah while the outside world is loudly celebrating, he requested with a mild irritated voice to close the windows. But it is a normal behavior and the decision is made without further discussion about who´s the best. 

I also deeply loved the artistic effects, with the long focus of the camera on the light and shadows reflected on the tensed faces of the actors. The silence while the camera stays focused tells more than the whole script sometimes. Especially for the case of people belonging to the religious realm, it reflects the unique interior life and the conflicts that often arise between what you want and you can´t say for reasons that pertain to religious obligations. The eyes and the more or less open exchange of sights - in line with the modesty requirements - are a world in themselves with their own grammar and expressivity rules.

On the other side, there are those things that I was not so happy about. Which is, the story itself: after her sister died during the later stages of pregnancy, Shira the youngest daughter of a respectable religious family, is tormented by the difficult choice she is faced with: marrying the husband of her late sister and thus the little baby born will not leave or follow her shidduchim plans. The movie starts with Shira and her mother, bursting out of innocent joy, spying on a funny bochur in a supermarket, that she would fancy to date. This, before the family is struck by misfortune. What can one do against misfortune? Especially if you are a religious person? Will Shira marry her brother-in-law?

There is not the ending I wanted, but it has to do with my own rebelious/selfish nature of rather doing what I think it is good for myself, instead of thinking at a macro-, larger level, which involves obligations and less feelings and emotions. 

The movie is relatiely short - 1h27 - and although I did not enjoy the story, I appreciated the play of the actors and the artistic effects. And this was a big won of my last movie evening.

Changing the Narrative: ´Between Iran and Zion: Jewish Histories of Twentieth-Century Iran´

In an effort to challenge the usual historiographical narrative about the Jewish diaspora, Lior B. Sternfeld researched alternative histories based on the experience of Iranian Jews. Between Iran and Zion: Jewish Histories of Twentieth-Century Iran helps better understand the complexities of the largest Jewish community in the Middle East outside Israel. 

´The intense relationships between Iran and Israel since 1979 have given proeminence to the false dichotomies and wrong assumptions that dominate the discourse instead of facts´. Indeed, at the level of the everyday political and international fight, it looks like Iran and Israel and the Jews in general are separate and antagonistic topics. The histories - I love so much this plural of honesty because it modestly outlines and acknowledges the epistemological limits of history - told by Sternfeld are being told in a larger context of Iranian communities part of the Iranian society. Which means that there are Jews living in Iran as part of the society, bearing Muslim-sounding names, marrying non-Jews, taking part to events such as the Islamic Revolution or the Iran-Iraq war.

His main challenger is the usual Zionist-oriented historiography, which denies to the Jews the possibility of living anywhere else but in Israel, therefore their diaspora histories must be affected by benign anti-Semitism. Which anti-Semitism actually exists, including in Iran, but Sternfeld is looking for different kind of stories - although it is a bit of denial to not introduce the murdering of Habib Elghanian a proeminent leader of the Tehrani Jews condemned to death by a revolutionary tribunal. Which challenges the narrative that mostly the poor Iranian Jews were actually affected by anti-Semitism and made aliyah - although many of them were deeply disappointed by the unfriendly political attitudes towards non-European Jews and left for America or even returned to Iran. But this is rather a political than an academic debate and what the reader is left with are a couple of good histories not told too often about the complex community which can trace its genealogy from the Babylonian Exile.  

Complex and preferably unbiased approached is the main approach that needs to be used when trying to understand the life of Jewish communities. Having in mind all those aspects is essential for a further acknowledgment of the diverse communities living in Israel, especially those originally from the Middle East. When the assumptions are eliminated from the historical research there are interesting realities revealing.

In the case of the Iranian Jews analysed in the book, it is worth mentioning the intellectual contributions of their representatives to the ideological construction of the Tudeh Party - which further developed as well individual contacts with members of the MAPAM, the Israeli United Workers´ Party active in Iran - as well as to the journalistic landscape during the Shah. Another historical chapter is represented by the support that members of the Jewish community offered to the prime-minister Mosaddeq, despite his partnership with the arguably anti-Semitic Ayatollah Kashani and his decision to severe ties with Israel. It would be interesting to read more (preferably) ideology-free contributions of the relationship between Iran and Israel - described off the record by the Shah himself as an ´extramarital affair´ - as well as of anti-Semitism during the Shah years. Another less known fact involves the Jewish presence during the protests that helped to install the Islamic Revolution, such as the fact that the Sapir Jewish Hospital in Tehran was used to treat wounded protesters protecting them from the long arm of SAVAK - the Shah´s internal security services with a reputation of no-mercy attitude towards political dissent. And there is even more: late in 1978, a delegation of the Jewish community visited to Paris the Ayatollah Khomeini himself in order to ensure that ´Jews would not be regarded as enemies of the revolution but rather as its supporters´. 

The distinction between Jews and Zionists or rather between religious and political Zionism persists today and permeates the public discourse and personal attitudes in Iran. The role of micro-histories is to take the wise distance from the political and ideological stamps and look into the personal testimonies and human contacts. One day, those contacts will be more than mediated by words, but hopefully by the strength of human intellect and direct contacts between humans who can communicate beyond the brainswashing language of ideology. It´s worth waiting for those times.

Rating: 4 stars

Book Review: An Unorthodox Match by Naomi Ragen

 

For me, Naomi Ragen is one of the Jewish authors writing Jewish stories that I can hardly put down. What I love about her books is how she is creating stories that sound so close from home, populated with authentic characters with deep and complex psychologies.

An Unorthodox Match - which I had in audiobook format - contrary to the literary and movie trends, is about a young woman, Lola/Leah, who decides to become religious and move to Borough Park and live, work and marry within a religious community. There is drama, but not that kind of drama the fans of Unorthodox - the book and the Netflix movie - are expecting. Of course, when you leave your secular life, everyone - especially your parents - are in shock. Of course that on the other side, the grass is not green and in addition to being suspicious, there is always the risk of being considered a second class Jew - even this is so anti-halachic and contrary to the very basis of our religion (what about Avraham avinu who was himself a idol worshipper, or Ruth the Moabite the great-greatmother of King David from whose lineage Mashiah will descend. A baal teshuva - BT - needs help and support and have to be half-deaf to not hear all the lashon hara that is said on his or her back.

Lola/Leah is going through her personal Gehenom as she is set on dates with people with serious mental disabilities or with other physical and personal issues. A kind woman with a golden heart she is helping in the house of Yaakov, a widower with five children who is pushed to have a new start by his energetic mother-in-law. His intention to marry Lola/Leah are welcomed with shock by the community and Yaakov´s own daughter, who is afraid that such an alliance will damage her chances of finding a good Torah scholar.

As in other book by Naomi Ragen I had the chance to read, the characters are going through complex personal transformations and choices. They unfairness of the shidduchim process and its incumbent crisis, the unfairness of the judgmental attitudes of the community, the pressure for role conformity and the unwelcoming attitude towards difference and deviants, as well as the terrific stigma of mental health are topics the people in the book - that can be easily identified with real people in any small or big Orthodox Jewish community - are reflexive about. 

Without taking stances, the book shows the complexity of people and issues affecting religious Jews, but also the need to search for a meaning, no matter your religious orientation, but a meaning which does not exclude the other and especially those who are not following your own interpretation of things.

A lot to think about for this Shabbes or for the rest of the holy month of Ellul. The King is in the fields and the yom ha´din of Yom Kippur is coming soon...

Rating: 4 stars