Amos Gitai completes his 'cities' trilogy with this Jerusalem-based study of the patriarchal nature of Hassidic Judaism.
Viewed from the perspective of its principal female characters, the film is bound to cause additional controversy via the casting of an Arab, Yussef Abu-Warda, as the rabbi ordering a childless scholar to dismiss his wife of ten years and remarry to perpetuate his line. In acceding, Meir (Hattab) abandons his beloved Rivka (Abecassis) to shameful exile within the tightly knit ultra-Orthodox Mea Shearim quarter.