Tell Me Everything, a new film by Moshe Rosenthal

Tell Me Everything is a new Israeli film, directed by Moshe Rosenthal, who also directed the highly acclaimed film “Karaoke”. This new film won acclaim at the Sundance Festival, and has been chosen to be the opening film (to be screened at the Sultan’s Pool) at the upcoming Jerusalem International Film Festival next month!

This somewhat artsy and complex film is about homosexuality in Israel during the 1980s when men were still closeted and hiding in unhappy marriages.  This is the time of the AIDS epidemic, when much was still unknown and there were irrational fears about the spreading of the disease.

The story revolves around Boaz at two different times in his life.  The first half of the film is about Boaz at the age of 13, preparing for and up to his Bar Mitzvah party.  He discovers that his father, Meir, is gay, and he becomes afraid that his father has AIDS and will give it to his mother.  Then he tells his two older sisters, and eventually Meir is outed to his mother.  The second half of the film is about Boaz’s developing sexuality, his relationship with his friends, and with his lonely mother. In everything he does, you see images of the younger Boaz’s face and eyes.  Eventually, we realize that Boaz is burdened by his love of family – he needs to be released from his mother’s hold on him, today, and he needs to be released from the feelings of guilt for having ruined his father’s life, back when he was an adolescent.

I went to see the film at the Israel Film Center Festival at the JCC of the Upper West Side in Manhattan. Following the screening, the filmmaker was interviewed on stage by Isaac Zablocki, the director of the Israel Film Center.  Rosenthal talked about how this film is largely autobiographical.  He explained that although his life story has been very different, “the texture and the family dynamic are the same”. In writing the script, he said, you take a story and then you change something crucial so that it isn’t your own story.   In real life, he explained, he isn’t the Boaz character.  Rather, “I am the one who came out. If I had lived earlier, I would be married and I would be Meir, the gay father.”

Tell Me Everything is about family dynamics---father-son relations and mother-son relations.  The film has very high aesthetic and artistic elements, including and especially the Bar Mitzvah scene, and makes wonderful use of music. Highly recommended!