Apples from the Desert, directed by Matti Harari
and Arik Lubetzky, is a modern morality tale.
Rivka is a 19-year-old girl from a Jerusalem haredi
(ultra-orthodox) family. She is a
rebellious daughter, interested in seeing the world, making a difference, and
not just marrying and having children.
Her strictly religious, Sephardi parents have a love-less relationship
and her authoritarian father has a cruel streak. She finally breaks and runs away when he
insists that she marry an older widower with children. The film is an adaptation of the story bySavyon Liebrecht.
A wonderful comic element is provided by Rivka's Aunt Sara
who is the spinster aunt and has more compassion and love of life than any of
the others surrounding her in her ultra-orthodox community where women are
judged by the length of their skirts rather than by their good deeds.
Rivka is helped in her escape by an intriguing young man who
raises organic apples in the desert. He
brings her to his kibbutz in the Negev desert, where she slowly comes out of
her shell and learns about a more open, tolerant and accepting world. We watch as she blossoms, much as the apples
growing in the desert climate.
In this
story about how an ultra-orthodox young woman breaks from her cloistered and
traditional family life and chooses to live a secular, modern lifestyle, we
learn about issues of family, tradition, love, compromise and acceptance.
Apples from the Desert was produced by United
King Films.
No comments:
Post a Comment