Parenthood comes at you fast. There’s no grace period, no moment of rest — whena child arrives, new joys and challenges appear instantly.
Charles Wahl’s short film莫赫尔, which premiered at the 2021 SXSW Film Festival last month, tells the story of a couple confronting one of the first challenges that new Jewish parents of baby boys face: thebrit milah.
当然，有一个各种问题这可以围绕这种犹太仪式，通常在婴儿生命中第八天举行，从雇用谁来邀请，邀请谁，无论是割礼。在莫赫尔，新的父母，詹姆斯和萝拉，特别面对一个问题：他们住在一个犹太人的地方，周围没有莫霍尔。
Through the couple’s story, which shows them balancing the need to please their families (James’ mother, in particular) with their own partnership, Wahl finds a way to subtly comment on many struggles of modern Jewish life. Among the big topics addressed in the 14-minute film include how to feel Jewish away from hubs of Jewish life; the gatekeeping ofJewish identity; and the sometimes-transactional nature of what should be highly spiritual events.
我通过电子邮件与Wahl谈到了这部电影的灵感，我最喜欢的重复时刻之一，并在屏幕上施加真实的犹太人。
This interview has been condensed and lightly edited.
Where did this idea come from?
The idea to make莫赫尔came from a conversation I was having with anotherJewish filmmaker虽然我们正在等待电影开始。我告诉他关于在一个带有较小犹太社区的地方的英国米拉进程的情况。谈话导致了其他故事 - 我听到的轶事，或者我多年来围绕宗教所看到的东西。
在讨论结束时，他说，“你必须拍这部电影。”睡觉后睡了一会儿，一种框架的方法，我觉得我感到非常有效地来到我身边。通过英国米拉的一对夫妇似乎是一个完美的milieu来解决我真正想探索的主题：经常交易性质的宗教以及在现代世界中维护宗教和古老世界传统的挑战。
Where exactly does the film take place?
它拍摄于新斯科舍省Dartmouth，但绝对的设置从未指定。
Do you live in a rural area, or in a place without many Jews? You seem to know that world, regardless. Any stories you want to share?
I grew up in Toronto, Ontario, which has a very vibrant Jewish community, and then moved to Halifax, Nova Scotia a few years ago; I work between the two places. Halifax is a proper city, but is much smaller than the larger city centers in Canada like Toronto, Montreal, and Vancouver. The Jewish community in Halifax is small but there is a presence here. Like in the film, though, there are no mohels here, or anywhere in AtlanticCanadafor that matter… which shocked me when I found out. So if anyone needs to have a brit milah anywhere in Atlantic Canada, you have to fly in a mohel from Toronto or another major center. So on top of the stress of having a newborn and putting together a brit milah in the middle of that chaotic time, you now also have to coordinate finding a mohel in another city and organize bringing them into town.
铸造过程是什么样的？您是否担心在没有大型犹太人的人口中找到社区中的犹太行为者？
在电影中扮演萝拉的Kaelen欧姆是第一个投下的人。我们以前的彼此合作short film,小灰色泡沫，我以为她会很完美。当我开始寻找合适的人来玩詹姆斯时，她就推荐了Daniel Maslany。我知道他是谁来自电视剧默多克奥秘, and thought he had the right vibe for it, so looked up more of his work, and the more I saw, the more I thought he could be a great James.
拉比菲尔的一部分绝对是最具挑战性的铸造。我想确保它是一个可以是真实的演员，也有足够强大的存在来摆动整个电影。我很幸运地说，一位朋友碰巧提到山姆罗森哈尔对我来说。当时，他是镇上的剧院的创意总监，并在同一晚上出现在一个节目中。我的妻子和我去看看这个节目，我以为他真的很擅长它，但他什么都没有the rabbi我在我的脑海里画了 - 他很干净的剃须，穿着一个漂亮的西装，似乎非常骗局。
Still, we met for coffee a few days later. Within five minutes of talking to him, I knew I had found the mohel. As a fellow Jew who grew up in the same community as I did, he clearly completely understood who this character was and the tone I was going for. He seemed passionate about it, and I could tell that we would commit to making it authentic.
Any stories from set?
实际上，拍摄本身非常光滑！我们最担心的是authenticity，特别是电影的所有宗教方面。在预生产中，萨姆和我遇到了当地的拉比，并与他一起过来。他非常慷慨地帮助了我们所需要的所有信息，包括适当的信息祈祷, the specific steps of the brit milah ceremony, and he also was a great sounding board for us with any other questions that popped up. The production designer and I also consulted with him to make sure all the props were authentic.
我对拍摄最紧张的事情正在与这样的人合作young baby. Again, we wanted the film to feel real, so we cast a very young baby in the film that was a bit small for his age so that, on camera, it could feel believable as a baby a couple would have just brought home. Having worked with babies before, I was terrified that he would disrupt the whole shoot with crying or fussing a lot within takes. We put a lot of contingencies in place if the baby ended up being fussy, like realistic dolls that we could use as a stand in, or during wide shots, but thankfully, we didn’t need any of it! The baby was very calm, peaceful, and didn’t fuss at all.
I love the ongoing struggle your protagonist has to keep on his kippah. Both funny and relatable, and also thematically resonant. Was that written in the script?
Haha yes, that was in the screenplay. That’s something that happens to me all the time and I thought it could be a good way to tie up how he still feels about religion at the end of the film, without him having to say any words. Even after everything James goes through over the course of the movie, he still honors the religionand traditionsthat are instilled into him.
你希望观众将带走这部电影吗？
My hope is that watching莫赫尔将促进审查和讨论在现代世界意味着宗教的宗教。无论一个人的宗教如何，我们都长大了与我们的传统和期望增长，然后被要求在不同的时间和经常在不同的环境中与他们一起生活。我认为随着时间的变化，我们需要更接受他人，尊重别人如何选择遵循他们的信仰。
莫赫尔几乎在2021年筛选西雅图国际电影节from April 8-18th作为其中的一部分“Leveling Up” program. Get tickets这里.
Header image via Charles Wahl
