Sabbath Queen (2024) [电影] 豆瓣
导演: Sandi DuBowski
Synopsis
One step after another, Sabbath Queen follows Amichai Lau-Lavie’s journey from radical drag queen to the synagogue, in the role of Rabbi and cultural agitator: a destiny of sorts, between tradition and counter-tradition, art and pacifism.
COMMENTARY
Amichai Lau-Lavie is a remarkable character: the scion to thirty-eight consecutive generations of orthodox rabbis, openly gay, inventor in the 1980s of the character Rebbetzin Hadassah, a drag queen, a scholar of the Torah, creator of the Storahtelling performance and of the Lab/Shulan, an inclusive Jewish congregation. After becoming a rabbi himself, he reinvented culture and religion through transgression, and above through art. In the finale, Amichai, referring to October 7th 2023, addresses Israel and Palestine asking. “How can we reimagine our sacred traditions to achieve peace?”
DIRECTOR'S STATEMENT
What struck me immediately about Amichai was his charisma and irreverent lightness, despite carrying the weight of descending from thirty-eight generations of rabbis; he is, after all, a shape-shifter, defying every definition. To the question: “Did you do the right thing?”, he answers: “I don’t know. Nor will we know for another hundred years”.

看过 Sabbath Queen 🌕🌕🌕🌕🌑
Coolidge Corner + Q&A session w/ director Sandi Dubowski. Reimagine being a Jew in a god-optional and anti-patriarchal community. 第一次看有关犹太教的作品,影厅里的观众大概90%都是liberal Jews老太太老爷爷,映后Q&A里还有几位说二十年前就看过导演以前拍的讲同性恋犹太人的纪录片,让ta们很受鼓舞。观看途中有点惊讶的是Amichai竟然会退回到orthodox pathway并成为rabbi。导演说他原本打算以这个身份转变为结尾,但之后发现重要的不是title而是how he used it。不过这种妥协还是有点让人气馁,只能说改革者真是任重而道远(唯一一让我膈应的是他的3个小孩到底是捐精还是代孕......