Kareth
Drama. Israel.
90 min.
Director & Writer: Tom Salama
Production: Ronen Machlis-Balzam
Production Company: Metaphor Ltd.
The romantic story of a queer relationship between Tomer (29), a single parent, who is attempting to convert his infant son (born through a surrogate), and Lazy (27), a handsome ultra-Orthodox man, who acts as Tomer’s guide during the conversion process. During the Sisyphean process, the two men end up being drawn together. At first, the situation is forced and tenuous, but soon they come to depend on each other and eventually want to be together. Then, against all odds, there is a flicker of passion, and the two men fall in love in the most unlikely time and place.
The love story that unfolds against the rigid, antiquated conversion process exposes Lazy’s personal struggle surrounding his identity in Manichaean, ultra-Orthodox society, where everything is divided between us and them, good and evil. And it reveals Tomer’s own struggle against the “monopoly that holds people’s fate in the balance, i.e., the Rabbinate. It is a very human struggle in which he fights for the most basic right of “the Other,” or outsider, to be a parent, and his own right to feel a sense of belonging. Ostensibly, Lazy and Tomer represent two extremes, but they share a single story. It is a tale about belonging, to place, community, and time, but also to passion and the truth. Lazy and Tomer go a long way, both together and separately, just so that they can be themselves. When there is nothing left to lose, fulfilling their emotional potential becomes is more possible than ever. They discover that despite all the hurt, in the end they will find the audacity and courage they need. The film highlights the vast distance between the clearly defined world that Lazy inhabits and the without boundaries and inhibitions of Tomer. As they discover, the gap between them is much wider than they ever imagined.