Back in July 2020, we wrote about幽灵般的拖车对于即将到来的Yiddish恐怖电影 - 是的，你读到了这一点。
坦率地坦率地说，作为一个恐怖的薄膜粉丝，我不认为我想看The Vigil, which premieres on Friday, Feb. 26. But after reading more about the film, which is being promoted as the “first Jewish horror movie,” I realized it was full of depth. The film takes a deep dive into issues surrounding Jewish identity and代际创伤and, from the very first scene, I was hooked.
The Vigil,Keith Thomas的书面和指导，揭示了所有美国港口的黑暗。yakov（大卫戴维斯），一名年轻的粗俗的简单情节中心，formerly Hasidic返回布鲁克林的犹太社区的人是一个shomer, or night watcher, over the body of a deceased Holocaust survivor. (This Jewish tradition is calledshemira, or sitting with the body, and is customary during the period ofaninut，死亡和埋葬之间的时间。）
The Vigilis, without a doubt, a horror movie, but it is one that’s deeply rooted in Jewish culture, from the depiction of Jewish customs, tothe Yiddishdialogue, to little details in this Brooklyn house of horrors, from the types of candies in the candy dish to theJewish arton the walls.
整个电影在一个令人暑地夜晚的过程中发生。当雅科夫坐在身体上时，他忍受了被困扰的痛苦Mazzik.，一个犹太怪物，以及他的痛苦own memories。We see flashbacks of one particular night that has haunted Yakov — no spoilers here! — and witness the monster begin to seep into other parts of his life. This is tempered by some truly chilling scenes involving Mrs. Litvak (the fabulous林恩科恩), the widow of the body Yakov is watching over.
铸件是完全犹太人，包括一些突出的演员，包括科恩，先前发挥了MAGDA欲望都市as well asGolda Meir在慕尼黑。(It was one of her of her final roles before she died last February.) The film also features Hasidic actor Menashe Lustig — who played a version of himself in the 2017 Yiddish filmMenashe— and who also served as the cast’s Yiddish coach.
Kveller spoke with Thomas — who attended rabbinical school and wrote his thesis about monsters in the Torah — to learn more about this one-of-a-kind film. We chatted about filming in Brooklyn, the deeply犹太铸件, and his aim to create, as he puts it, “a horror film that felt Jewish, the way that I understand feeling Jewish.”
这次采访一直被凝聚和轻微编辑。
Why did you decide to make a Jewish horror movie? And a movie in Yiddish, in particular?
这位古老的作家的格言是“写下你所知道的”。所以我想，我能让什么感觉独特和不同？我实际上是什么，个人知道我没有见过？
I thought, I haven’t seen a truly Jewish horror film. There have been Jewish horror films withdybbuks.像邪恶的灵魂一样，拥有人的东西，但他们几乎总是发生在非犹太人身上。所以我想，这是一个有趣的角度：让我们做一个真正的犹太恐怖电影 - 即通过犹太教的镜头，这是涉及的犹太主题和想法，同时，在它的中心有一种犹太恐怖的实体。
此外，核心的核心概念 - 我就是这样，没有人是如何对此做出恐怖电影的？有人坐在一起尸体？我的意思是，来吧！
Was it important to you to have a very Jewish cast, and what impact do you think that had on the final product?
这对几个原因很重要。这是一个小小的铸件，因为大多数电影都在我们的领先地位。非常重要的是，他是犹太人，而且他被在这个世界上正宗的人所包围的人。所以，在电影的开头，有一个人围绕着一个人感觉像是Footstepsmeeting for people who are ex-Hasidic. And everyone at that table, other than Dave Davis, is formerly Hasidic — they’re all from that community.
戴夫的铸造只是那些惊人的偶然时刻之一。我一直在采访其他演员，大多数人都会说yiddish。我休息一下，因为我没有找到我想要的东西。然后我刚刚碰巧看了一部戴夫的电影。我告诉我的生产者，“我需要一个这样的人。”而且他们就像，“你为什么不接到他？”所以我做到了。它结束了他的家人from New York, too. And he has a lot of the same background I do. It just worked out amazingly.
戴维斯的背景的哪些部分您认为帮助他的角色？
对于戴夫来说，这个过程很多关于重新发现自己的根源。他有家人，Holocaust survivors早些时候,人们来到纽约to escape antisemitism. That was very personal, kind of getting back to his roots. At the same time, you know, when he started the film, he didn’t speak anyyiddish.。所以他刚刚拿了这个训练，只是沉浸自己。他喜欢它。他仍然很好地拥有很多人，他在那些在人们帮助他翻译的东西方面遇到了这一伙伴，以及给他方言，习惯
What was Menashe Lustig’s behind-the-scenes role like? Did he help maintain authenticity of the Yiddish dialogue?
Definitely. When I first got to New York for pre-production, I sat down with Menashe and we translated from English to Yiddish, his lines in particular. And that was a great process; a lot of things that I had written, he was like, “We don’t have this word in Yiddish.” He’d say, ‘Well, in the community, we’d say this,” and that was coming from a place of real authority. He knew exactly what we were trying to get at and what they would say.
This movie was one of Lynn Cohen’s final works before she passed away. What was it like working with her?
她有这样一个丰富的历史 - 超过100个表演。这只是有机的，她可以打开它的方式，只是做她的事情。她在窜了她拥有祖母在她的表现方面。不一定是痴呆症，但她正在使用的口音，以及她唱歌的小歌。它对她感到个人 - 你知道，我所爱。
代党创伤 - 从大屠杀和犹太祖先 - 是电影的巨大主题。是创伤的恶魔吗？
如果你看着rabbinic文学，你会发现对Mazziks的引用，他们只是恶魔。参考文献说，“只是不要进入那座房子，因为那里可能有一个恶魔或一个mazzik。”但它从未描述过Mazzik看起来像什么，所以我必须弥补它。
我想，“我们如何制作一些感觉新的和不同但同时是电影主题的直接体现？”因为你总是回头看，其中一个大主题从来没有能够前进。所以我想，让我们做那个文字 - 让你的头部扭曲向后扭曲，所以它经常看过去。
The Vigil现在正在流媒体IFC Center at Home， 和其他流媒体服务to follow.
Danielle Freiberg（IFC电影）的标题图像
