Veteran Israeli director Avi Nesher is an uncommonly ambitious and fearless filmmaker. His latest film, Secrets (HaSadot), calmly broaches as many taboos as it can. A gripping and occasionally melodramatic argument for the emancipation of religious women, it draws equally on Yentl and “Buffy the Vampire Slayer.”
Secrets screens in the Seattle Jewish Film Festival on Sun., May 3.
Naomi is a Talmud prodigy with the promise to be a great scholar and rebbe like her father. Instead, she’s lined up to marry his prize pupil and become a perfect Orthodox wife. She’s mighty strong-willed, however, and her father agrees to let her go to an all-girls yeshiva in Tzfat.
Naomi’s roommates range from a chubby sidekick to a new — yet still goth — frummie, with a wild card named Michelle thrown in for exotic, dramatic spice. Michelle has just returned from living in France for several years, and her bilingualism comes in handy when she and Naomi are assigned to bring food to a terminally ill French woman, Anouk (Fanny Ardant).
Anouk gradually discloses her secret anguish, inspiring Naomi and Michelle to devise a program of healing Kabbalistic rituals so she can make peace with God before she dies. Needless to say, the girls risk extreme punishment for the sins of thinking for themselves and practicing high-level Judaism without male genitalia.
The ancient city of Tzfat (at least in the movies) is a mysterious catalyst that brings every character’s true nature and inner desires to the fore. The story goes places you likely won’t expect — and may not appreciate — and, unfortunately for Naomi, what happens in Tzfat does not stay in Tzfat.
Secrets takes us into a world we rarely glimpse, and imbues its inhabitants with passion, humor and a fierce spirit. It also reflects Israeli cinema’s knack, exemplified by such films as Eytan Fox’s The Bubble, for translating specifically Israeli concerns into entertaining and accessible works that easily transcend borders.
Spilling Secrets
