Mitzpe Ramon overlooking Ramon Crater
WEDDING DOLL (Hatuna MeNiyar) C+
Israel (82 mi) 2015
d: Nitzan Giladi
Sort of a cross between the emotional fragility of The Glass Menagerie and the societal brutality
shown to those who are different in WELCOME TO THE DOLLHOUSE (1995), featuring
the travails of an attractive young special needs adult, Hagit (Moran
Rosenblatt), whose mental deficiencies and childlike innocence are seen
throughout, with a broad, engaging smile that greets nearly everyone, or her
angered frustration with her mother, Sara (Assi Levy), whose everpresent, watchful
eye prevents the kind of emancipation Hagit desires. Relentlessly picked on by other kids in the
neighborhood who continually tease her and call her names, where in an earlier
incident she was traumatized when badly injured from a cruel incident, something
her mother has never forgotten, so she tries as best she can to protect her
from the outside world. The problem, of
course, is that the more she shelters her daughter, the greater her need for
independence, as she’s happiest out on her own.
The film opens in a fragile and delicate world of Hagit meticulously
constructing tiny dolls, usually representative of a bride or groom, as there
are photos of wedding gowns surrounding the walls to her room. One might say she is obsessed with the
subject, as she dreams of getting married, thinking she would finally be free
of the suffocating presence of her mother.
Yet time and again, we see her mother bale her out of unfortunate
circumstances, where she obviously has her best interests at heart, but Hagit
is smothered by her incessant, overly cautious restrictions, even going so far
as turning her mother’s alarm clock off in the morning and sneaking out of the
house on her own, only to be found waiting at a bus stop or walking down the
road when her mother pulls up to offer a ride, knowing how easily it is for her
to get hurt, as she is continually taunted and harassed by mean-spirited kids. She does have a job to go to, where she works
in a tiny toilet-paper factory, where the kindly owner Aryeh (Aryeh Cherner) is
aware that he is “helping” her, allowing her in turn to help package his
products, while his son Omri (Roy Assaf), seen cutting larger rolls stretching
nearly ten feet into smaller more usable products, is just about the only other
company employee. Surprisingly Hagit
flirts with him all the time, giving him the most recent doll that she made,
where they can be seen kissing behind the scenes, unbeknownst to the
owner.
While there is a predictable structure to the film, edited throughout
as a horror film, where from the outset the audience is waiting for some
horrible unforeseeable event to occur, the filmmaker is content to postpone the
inevitable until the end, constructing a growingly familiar world around the
central figure, while at the same time offering a behind-the-scenes glimpse of
the life Sara is secretly hiding from her daughter, as she receives nightly
phone calls from an interested boyfriend admirer who would obviously like to
spend more time with her than she allows, as she’s required to look after
Hagit. While it’s clear she’s sacrificed
her own life for Hagit, but as she grows older, she’d like to think she could
have a life all her own as well. Hagit
presses her for independence, yet when she gives it to her, such as leaving her
alone to spend the night with her friend, Hagit is never far from her mind,
never knowing what to expect when she returns, as she’s haunted by the
possibilities, where it only takes a single incident of inflicted horror to
damage her life forever. The one element
of surprise is the remoteness of the location, set in Mitzpe Ramon, a small
town on a ridge overlooking the Negev Desert, where the scenery is spectacular,
including the presence of wild Nubian ibex running free. Home of the 500 foot deep Ramon
Crater, one of Israel’s largest national parks, it contains a natural water
source to sustain the animal population, with the crater created by eons of natural
erosion, as the region was once covered by an ocean millions of years ago,
while now the town supports a tiny population of less than 5000 residents. Omri has a habit of throwing pebbles on Hagit’s
window, which is a sign for her to meet him out on the cliffs overlooking the
enormous expanse of the desert, where the vast emptiness may as well be a
metaphor for her seemingly unobtainable idea of romance. To Hagit, Omri’s love is real, where she
expects they will be married one day, so she roundly rejects the friendship of
other special needs male companions that her mother arranges to come and visit. Her refusal to even come out of her bedroom during
visits is hurtful to the other boy, who has to face his own constant stream of
societal rejection.
While the film fully explores the lives of mother and
daughter, Sara, burdened with the responsibility to care for Hagit, is unable
to spend much time with her married son Chen (Tomer Kapon) and his newborn
baby, whose own views towards his sister are somewhat backwards, believing she
belongs in an institution or a group home, still stinging apparently from an
incident where Hagit nearly dropped his baby, unable to summon the trust
afterwards. These same thoughts run
through Sara’s mind as well, constantly wondering what’s best for Hagit,
visiting group homes and trying to imagine her daughter living there, where
it’s a daily struggle to face her daughter’s constant resistance to her
concerns. Making matters worse, the
factory is continually losing money, so despite Omri’s assurances to Hagit,
believing he can change his father’s mind, the factory will be closing
soon. Searching for work elsewhere
provides one of the saddest moments of the film, as she applies for a job in a
store that sells wedding attire, supposedly the idealization of all her dreams,
but they’re looking for a seamstress, while Hagit simply imagines surrounding
herself with all the beautiful things in the store all day long, quite a stark
contrast to the more crude conditions of a toilet-paper factory. When the store never calls back, she thinks
there’s something wrong with her phone, instead, they simply filled the
position with someone who could actually do the job they were looking for, a
reality that Hagit can never truly comprehend, as she constantly lives in her dreams. When the film pivots into Omri’s world, it
takes a turn for the worse, as his friends routinely call Hagit a “retard,”
making fun of Omri for even hanging out with her, where their unsympathetic
nature is ugly and crude, reflecting a miserablist view of humanity that exists
throughout the film, where outside of Hagit’s dreamlife are vile haters and
mean-spirited people who wouldn’t think twice about having fun at Hagit’s
expense, making her the butt of all jokes.
This descent into savage cruelty is not altogether unexpected, but is
difficult viewing for the beastly inhumanity on display, where guys think
mocking others weaker than they are is just hilarious, getting drunk while
feeling her up, even stupidly thinking they’re giving her a good time. She’s terrified at the craven depravity she’s
forced to endure before running away, where the audience has to wonder where
can she ever be safe from this coarse treatment, which is the central question
asked by this film all along. While
there are no easy answers, this film dwells on the misanthropic, offering
little hope in human progress. The film
won the FIPRESCI prize for best Israeli first film, also best first film
overall, and best actress for Assi Levy as the mother at the Jerusalem Film
Festival of 2015.
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