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The flower of the neighborhood: the director who brought the Israeli company into the "Burning" tower Israel today

2022-09-29T10:24:18.026Z


He fell in love with directing at the age of 7 thanks to Spielberg's dinosaurs and conquered the Americans with a cheeky and sexually oozing network series • Now Moshe Rosenthal is releasing "Karaoke", his first full-length film - which is receiving an enthusiastic reception at festivals and theaters • In a personal interview, he reveals what became of an apartment tower In Holon for "Spectal", what was based on the characters of his parents in the script, and how did he manage to convince Lior Ashkenazi to play "more feminine and snakey"


Already when he was a 7-year-old boy, Moshe Rosenthal knew he wanted to be a director.

"The decision was made for me when I watched 'Jurassic Park' for the first time, in the cinema, with my father. Every Saturday we would go together to see a movie. I really remember that moment, when I tried to understand what was going on behind the scenes and who actually was the man doing all this. It became I dream of making movies.

"I was one of those kids who act out movies in their head, who lock themselves in a room and make an entire show with themselves. To this day, I sometimes ask myself if this is really what I want to do, or if I'm still chasing the dreams of a 7-year-old who knows nothing about life."

30 years have passed, and Rosenthal's (37) childhood dream is coming true.

These days he is releasing "Karaoke", his first full-length film, to cinemas.

According to the reactions he has received so far, you can bet that this is the opening shot of a glorious career.

"Karaoke" is indeed an excellent movie.

Stylish, surprising, stimulating - and looks great on the big screen.

Sasson Gabbai and Rita Shukron, who star in it in the main roles (and both won an Ophir award for their wonderful work), play Meir and Tova - a married couple on the verge of retirement who live in a seemingly luxurious apartment tower in the suburbs of Holon.

Their gray and boring routine life is broken by Itzik (Lior Ashkenazi, also wonderful), a rich and very charismatic man, who moves into the building and starts hosting loud karaoke parties in his luxurious penthouse.

The entry of the new neighbor into the routine of Meir and Tova's lives (and the lives of the other neighbors) destabilizes the balance of power in the entire residential tower and puts the heroes into a dramatic and passion-filled whirlwind.

Rosenthal's clever script produces an abundance of funny, moving and empathetic human moments that capture both the Israeli psyche - and human nature as a whole.

"Karaoke" made its world premiere at the last Tribeca Festival, in June, and was warmly received.

At the Jerusalem Film Festival, held in July, Rosenthal's film picked up two awards, and at the Ophir Awards ceremony, held two weeks ago, he ended the evening with four statuettes out of 14 nominations.

"I was fascinated by the idea of ​​letting the characters use karaoke as a tool to express themselves," explains Rosenthal, "especially Meir and Tova, who are both very repressed and emotionally restrained. I also liked the way in the film the karaoke is connected to a discussion about authenticity. It's funny, because there is something most inauthentic about karaoke In the world. People make covers of other people's songs, with a cheap microphone and cheap sound. But precisely from this inauthentic place some kind of truth comes out."

At what stage in writing the script did you know which song each character in the film would sing?

"Already in the first draft. I chose the songs from a very intuitive place, I felt that they explained who the characters were in the past, what feelings they had. For example, Sasson Gabai, who sang 'What's important today' by Avi Toledano from the seventies. I initially looked for a lot of other options, but two days before The filming was based on this song."

Do you like karaoke yourself?

"You can say I'm a hobbyist, but I admit that I'm a little fed up. For years, I would organize a karaoke party at home, every birthday. It became a kind of thing. But this year, around the movie, I had a lot of karaoke, so I decided to stop the tradition." .

Sasson Gabai and Rita Shukron in "Karaoke".

"As far as I'm concerned, cinema is at its best when it comes from the heart and not from the head" Photo: Hadas Proosh, Photo: Hadas Proosh

What songs do you like to "perform"?

"Give me a second to think. Wow, I can't believe I haven't watched a question like this. Puriner's 'I Wanna Know What Love Is', Chris Isaak's 'Wicked Game' and The Moody Blues' 'Nights in White Satin'."

The suburbs of Holon look like a million dollars in the movie.

It is indeed your hometown, but what pushed you to place the film there?

"During the filming, people kept coming to us and asking: 'Why are you filming here? What's already here?'

This is exactly why I wanted to film in Holon. Although I did not grow up in the neighborhood where the film takes place, after I left home my parents moved to the new neighborhoods of the city, to the area where these towers are located.


"When I came to visit them, I stood on the balcony and looked at the 'Israeli suburbs,' the so-called , and it was very strong.

On a visual level, I felt it was not something you see a lot in Israeli films.

It was important to me to bring this world to life with a lot of cinematic magic.

to do a show in Holon".

The tower where the characters live is almost a character in itself.

"The building is very important, because it depicts the world in an honest way, and it is possible to reveal the Israeli middle class and the particular type of bourgeoisie through it. The social hierarchy within the middle class. There is something very human in the feeling that there is always someone above you and there is always someone below you. This is a film that could to happen in any country. When there's a party upstairs and you're not invited to it - it's something that works anywhere, at any age and in any language."

"We are all the same"

Rosenthal got the idea for "Karaoke" precisely from a case that happened to his parents, Eti, a professional makeup artist, and Max, a director of operations at a kitchen manufacturing company.

"They came back one evening from a wedding and asked me to look for them on Facebook for a couple they met there. When the photo of the couple came up, I was very surprised, because they were very flamboyant, with velvet jackets. It fascinated me to see the almost childish need of my parents to find new friends who might be an opening to an adventure.

"It reminded me of my feelings when I was 15 years old, just before high school, just before life was about to open up. The anticipation and excitement of someone revealing the world to you. It made me think a lot about my parents' generation and the similarities between the period of adolescence and the period they are in, At their age. In both cases, life is about to change, and there is suddenly an opportunity to discover and shape it. I thought it would be nice to tell an intimate coming-of-age story, and that the questions that would emerge from there would be significant for both 15-year-olds and 60-year-olds."

To what extent are the characters of Meir and Tova based on your parents?

"Meir has more of me than my father, but Tova has a lot of my mother. As part of the casting process for Rita Shukron, I met her with my mother. Everything Tova wears in the film came from my mother's closet, including the crocodile shoes. The two connected and formed a bond Gorgeous.

"However, I wouldn't want them to make this direct implication, that Meir and Tova are allegedly my parents, because that's not accurate. Although I grew up in a family where they always told me to 'make a film about us,' meaning that I should take inspiration from home, but when I did that, I suddenly got scared I began to wonder how much they would be able to connect, and if they would enjoy it."

And what were they really thinking?

"After the premiere screening at the Jerusalem Festival, I looked for my mother to ask her what she thought. I found her doing a Greek dance on the Cinematheque plaza, in a circle of people standing around and clapping. I said to myself, 'Okay, it probably went well.' I was happy to find out that both she and Dad I felt that the film gives voice to things they know, but also to something broader.

"Because in the end, this dynamic, of a couple that has been married for 40 years, is familiar to almost all old couples. The division of roles, the little comments. When I hear the audience laughing in the film, it automatically confirms to me that I borrowed from my parents the things that manage to touch a wide audience. Everyone can relate With the same situations and the same dynamics. In the end we are all the same."

An exception in this sense is Itzik, the enigmatic character played by Lior Ashkenazi.

This is an agent of flamboyant models who lands in Holon after a long period in Miami, where he accumulated money, power and status.

He immediately positions himself as the "big man of the world": drives around in an eye-popping luxury car and enjoys sprinkling stardust (and other powders) on his provincial fans, making them feel important.

"I have known such types in my life," explains Rosenthal.

"Especially during my youth. I was always the coolest kid in the class, and I remember as a teenager experiencing the dependence on the recognition and love of another person that makes you feel special, like the sun is shining on you, and then when he abandons you and moves on - it's very lonely and painful.

"Lior brought humanity to the character. I worked with him before, and everywhere he goes he carries his charisma with him. When Lior enters a room, he makes people wake up. Everyone looks at him with adoring eyes and throws a lot of things at him psychologically. That's why I thought he would be able to deepen the character , that we can see in his game Itzik's obsessive need to be loved, and the loneliness and lack of satisfaction that come with it.

"Itzik is very interesting to me. With every person around him, he has a slightly different persona. He changes a little each time in favor of what people see in him. I asked Lior what he thought of Itzik's sexual identity, and he said: 'Just a narcissist, that's his sexual definition.' Itzik wants everyone to love him, and he will give everyone what they need for that to happen."

Did you happen to think about the similarity between the character of Itzik, who embodies a "larger than life" promise of glamor and fame, and the character of the film director?

"Personally, it is very important to me never to give this impression, of glamor and fame. It is always important to me to make it clear that under every red carpet there is a dirty floor. I do not sell illusions to people. Honest interactions are important to me. I prefer to stay on the ground and leave the ego aside In short, I'm a pretty shy person."

"does not belong to the sectarian discourse"

The choice of veteran actors like Gabbay, Shukron and Ashkenazi to work with an unknown director at the beginning of his career was a gamble for them, but her enthusiastic reception of the film's winner proves that they put the chips on the winning color.

"I think when you give actors like them a chance to break out of the typecast and suddenly do something different and challenging, it ignites a spark in them alongside the fear. All three of them knew that they were daring to go into unfamiliar territories in the film. In my opinion, this is the reason they have such long careers and are still at the top."

Isn't it stressful, as a director without a lot of experience?

"I actually had the easiest time with Sasson. The man has an incredible 50-year career behind him, and in a very unexpected way he came to the shoot from a place of learning. He asked me questions about everything, just like a student who has just left Nissan Nativ and is playing for the first time. That's how it felt With Lior, I pushed to bring out of him, as an actor, the things that are a little more feminine and a little more snakelike."

With Lior Ashkenazi.

"Transmitting loneliness in a game", photo: courtesy of Gaudamos productions and Lev cinemas

You push your characters pretty far.

Weren't you afraid that you might overdo it and lose the audience along the way?

"Of course I was scared. But I want to believe that the Israeli mainstream is open to slightly edgy things, as long as they speak to them in a respectful and loving way. I knew I was making a film for the general public, but at the same time I wanted to take things a step further, cross the border. Promote the discourse , to dare. You have to do it elegantly, and not wave it in the viewers' faces. Not to provoke and not to promote an agenda. All in all, I try to present the human complexity of the situation. I didn't feel like I was imposing anything on the audience. In my opinion, it's funny to talk about That - without talking about it."

Quite unusually for an Israeli film, "Karaoke" has a very sensual atmosphere, a feeling of sexual liberation, that anything can happen and everything goes.

"It's because I'm interested and attracted to the gray areas. There is something about sexuality that feels dichotomously divided into categories. But in my opinion, many times sexuality can be present even without being an expression of attraction or sexual identity. It can simply give expression to a person's psychology, or to the power relations between people. Sexuality can express something completely different."

Israeli society today is very conservative.

Do you think it has a place in the discourse?

"In my opinion, as long as I believe in what I do - it has a place in the discourse. The most important task of creators, especially in cinema, is not to convey messages or to preach. For me, cinema is at its best when it carries from the heart and not from the head. This is what allows me to dive into all areas The grays that cannot be expressed in words, in a post on Facebook or in a hashtag. We are much more complex than our opinions, and much more complex than our sexual or religious or class definition. Cinema is one of the mediums that can truly describe this complexity."

I get the impression that in general you are against definitions.

"The classic definitions don't sit well with me. In many places in my life I was not able to fit myself into the category I was supposed to belong to, and this created a need for me to constantly open up the discourse. For example, I am of half-Turkish and half-Egyptian descent, but my last name is Rosenthal, which in general is based on What a German great grandfather.

"Even in the sectarian discourse, which has been very dominant in recent years, I don't feel like I belong. Even there I feel I'm in the gray. Because I'm not a Mizrachi who can now raise a flag and talk about oppression, but I'm also not an Ashkenazi, because I ate malokhiya (a classic dish from the The Egyptian; YK) and my parents spoke Arabic and our people."

With his parents, Etty and Max.

"I borrowed from them the things that touch a wide audience" Photo: Rafi Deloya, Photo: Rafi Deloya

"Likes to go all the way"

Although "Karaoke" is his first full-length film, Rosenthal has managed to do quite a bit since he finished his film studies at Tel Aviv University.

Besides his work as a screenwriter in comedy series (such as "Tom Yaer makes the Israeli path" and "Tom Yaer makes matriculation"), he also wrote and directed two short films that were quite successful.

The first, "Shabbaton" (2016), was honored with the best director award at the Jerusalem Festival.

The second, "On the Way Back" (2018), was nominated for the Ophir Award for Best Short Film (and was Rosenthal's first collaboration with Lior Ashkenazi).

In addition to that, in 2016 Rosenthal conceived, wrote and directed "Confess", a provocative network series consisting of short stories that describe sexual encounters through dating apps.

The episodes were divided into different sexual categories, in a style reminiscent of porn sites, and some of the scripts, he said in the past, drew their inspiration from his own experiences.

Despite the bold content, well-known actors such as Noa Kohler, Yossi Marshak, Maor Schweitzer and Erez Driggs participated in the series.

The series did not arouse much interest in Israel, but managed to attract the attention of the American network AMC ("Mad Men", "Breaking Bad"), which purchased it in order to produce an American version.

The task was entrusted to director/actress Julie Delphi ("Before Sunrise").

You said before that you were shy.

How does this fit in with the rather extreme network series you directed?

"On the one hand, I'm really a very shy and very private person, but on the other hand, I have an unstoppable need to create things that feel important and vital to me - and to go with them to the end. So I try to make some sort of separation. As a creator and as a director, I have to go to the end, but as a person Private I try to keep the boundaries to myself.

"I am at peace with my shyness, because I know that I have the other persona, who does the wild thing and who dares to go far. If you go far with your films, when you come home afterwards you can be a good boy in Jerusalem."

Did the sale of the series open doors for you in Hollywood?

Are you interested in trying your luck there?

"Yes, I'm aiming there. I write in English. I have the interest and the curiosity to make big films with effects as well. But I got used to guarding myself from my dreams. When I was in Los Angeles I lived in an amazing house in the Hollywood Hills, and from the bedroom window In mine you could see the Hollywood sign in the giant. I refused to look at it, I would walk by and lower my head. I said to myself: 'Don't fall for the dream, don't let your heart break.'

"I took great care of myself and made sure to remember that if I really believe in my ambitions and dreams - it won't end here. There will always be more. I think it's a very healthy place to be. To believe and push to achieve your dreams, but also take care of yourself."

yishai.kiczales@gmail.com

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Source: israelhayom

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