Talk of The Villages Florida - View Single Post - "Orthodox" on Netflix is a beautiful character study
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Old 04-13-2020, 05:54 PM
queasy27 queasy27 is offline
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Default "Orthodox" on Netflix is a beautiful character study

If you have four hours and enjoy shows with a profound sense of place, you might give this a try. I'm still thinking about it a week later.

The pacing is languid and intimate, relying heavily on flashbacks to show what prompted a 19-year old married woman to flee her Hasidic Jewish community. Her story in the present is taut as she is tracked by her husband and cousin to attempt to make her return home.

I loved the deep specificity of this particular Jewish community in Williamsburg, but it's the nuanced performance of Shira Haas as Esty that makes the show truly memorable. Amit Rahav is also wonderful as her husband trying to navigate both his own confused feelings about his marriage and an alien secular world.

Rated TV-MA for brief nudity and language. One of the major storylines is about sexual intimacy, but it's heartbreaking rather than titillating.

Some of the dialog is in Yiddish with English subtitles. There's also a separate feature on how the show was made.