The couple behind the new Israeli film ‘Midlife’

Amid the current war, the creators behind the new Israeli movie Midlife, which opened in theaters around Israel on Thursday, are certain that audiences will welcome the chance to see a love story that mixes questions of religious identity with romance. 

Midlife, directed by Yariv Horowitz and Danni Reisfeld, from a screenplay by Reisfeld and his wife, Hila Mor-Reisfeld, along with Livnat Vardi Orzach, and based on a novel by Dudi Goder, features a cast of some of Israel’s biggest stars in the story of two sisters whose lives take different paths and are brought back together in an unexpected way. 

It’s a contemporary story that has some obvious biblical parallels. It opens with Ahinoam (Chen Amsalem Zaguri, best known for the television series, Zaguri), an ultra-Orthodox wife, browsing in a store and trying on jeans. Clearly, something is up with her and when she returns home, she takes her daughters and walks out on her husband. The police pick them up and send the children back to her husband, and she goes to see her sister, Sari (Moran Cohen Gross), who left the fold years before and is now living in Tel Aviv and married to Yonatan, a pilot (Tsahi Halevi, who starred in such series as Line in the Sand and Fauda and the movies Bethlehem and Mossad). 

But Sari, who is pregnant, doesn’t feel secure enough in her new life to welcome her sister and turns her away. Ahinoam goes back to the streets, where Nissim (Shalom Assayag of Manayek and The 90s), a spiritual leader in a West Bank community who is also from a troubled background, offers her a place to live. She takes to life in the settlement and brings back others rescued from the streets to live there, although she maintains her secular identity, which at times is a struggle. 

Sari and Yonatan face a crisis of their own when Sari becomes ill. She feels guilty about having turned her back on her sister and Yonatan also has strong feelings of guilt over his philandering. They seek out Ahinoam and try to make amends, leading them to move to the settlement and embrace a very different lifestyle, which then leads to a new love story. 

The Raisefelds' own story 

The Raisfelds have a love story of their own. They have been married for 20 years and been collaborating on movies just as long. “On our first date, we wrote the synopsis for White Panther,” said Hila, referring to their 2013 movie about a Russian immigrant, torn between life with a skinhead gang and a career in boxing, who is mentored by a Moroccan coach portrayed by Ze’ev Revach, in a role that parallels Nissim in their latest film. 

Not long after they wrote the White Panther synopsis in 2002 (it can take quite a while to get movies made in Israel) they got word that they had received development money for the film and Danni said, “I thought, ‘She’s a keeper,’” about Hila, his then-girlfriend. White Panther is now screened around the country in schools, the military, and other frameworks to educate young people about racism and accepting diversity. They have recently shown it to evacuees from Kiryat Shmona, in the presence of Yevgeny Orlov, the star of the film, who now works full-time to help troubled youth.  

They now have three children. “With every movie we make, there’s a child,” Danni joked. 

They were given Dudi Goder’s novel by a friend just as Hila went into labor with their third child. During the long and difficult labor, they read the novel and decided that it would be the basis for their next project. They are optimistic that it will find an audience, even in today’s troubled times. 

Quoting from a key scene in the film, Hila said, “‘Even darkness is part of the journey. Every human being goes into darkness, into his cave. He must light a small candle and bring the light in... ‘It doesn’t matter who you are, if you are secular, if you are observant, if you are ultra-Orthodox.”

Said Danni, “That’s what Hila said to me that made me want to make this movie. At first, I was talking about conflicts between religious and secular and she said, ‘Let’s make a love story, a romantic, impossible love story. The messages will come through the back door. But let’s not focus on the messages, let’s tell a love story.’”

It’s a love story that goes in different directions. “It’s a story about love between people of different backgrounds,” said Hila. “It’s also about the love of the land, the love for a place, the location where it was filmed that is so breath-taking, I get emotional just seeing the landscapes in the film.” “It’s a movie about unconditional love,” said Danni. “It’s a movie about a woman who has had a tough life falling in love, finding the right person, and it’s also about loving the land and loving God and finding yourself.”

The couple, whose children popped in and out of the Zoom interview, said that while it was challenging to work together so intensively, it was also rewarding. “We understand each other,” said Danni. “With all the frustration and pressure of making a movie, you have to find the patience and love in yourself... I would never want to make movies with anyone else.”