In 2023, Seven Blessings was the big winner at the Ophir Awards (the Israeli Oscars, as it were): Best picture, script, director, actress, supporting actress, and more. Not best actor or best supporting actor; the movie was definitely about women although a couple of male supporting roles were carried off well.
There are some big family scenes with lots of characters speaking at once in a melange of Hebrew, Moroccan Arabic, and French, and they must have been quite a professional challenge for the cast and crew to present with such panache, but to tell the truth, I found them hard to follow. I had a much better time with the scenes involving only two or three characters.
We in the audience can quickly identify with the protagonist as their guide to her family, which is troubled in various ways-- some interconnected, some not. The atmosphere takes a turn when we realize we're identifying with a character who is troubled herself and whose behavior reflects her troubledness. At that point, the movie cashes in on the sympathy we've built up for her, and the movie moves toward a sad but somewhat redemptive conclusion. The script, by the way, was co-written by the lead actress herself, Reymonde Amsalem.
There are some big family scenes with lots of characters speaking at once in a melange of Hebrew, Moroccan Arabic, and French, and they must have been quite a professional challenge for the cast and crew to present with such panache, but to tell the truth, I found them hard to follow. I had a much better time with the scenes involving only two or three characters.
We in the audience can quickly identify with the protagonist as their guide to her family, which is troubled in various ways-- some interconnected, some not. The atmosphere takes a turn when we realize we're identifying with a character who is troubled herself and whose behavior reflects her troubledness. At that point, the movie cashes in on the sympathy we've built up for her, and the movie moves toward a sad but somewhat redemptive conclusion. The script, by the way, was co-written by the lead actress herself, Reymonde Amsalem.
