Between The Temples Review: An Odd and Insightful Couple

A prolific presence on the ultra-low-budget indie scene of the 2010s, Nathan Silver has always been fascinated by community relations, illusions and the imaginary, themes that find an enriching and sympathetic arrangement in this offbeat comedy. Between the templeshis first feature film in six years and his most accessible work to date. Jason Schwartzman plays Ben Gottlieb, a cantor at a liberal synagogue somewhere in upstate New York who has lost his singing voice. The problem is clearly psychological: it’s been a year since Ben’s wife, an acclaimed writer, died in a freak accident, and he’s caught up in the contradiction that defines depression.

Life, both present and future, seems meaningless, as every setback and indignity takes on additional symbolic significance, demanding to be read either as a metaphor for his condition or as confirmation of the irreversibility of that condition. Ben’s two mothers, Meira (Caroline Aaron) and Judith (Dolly de Leon), continue to set him up on dates without his permission; the rabbi (Robert Smigel de Saturday night live and Triumph the Insult Comic Dog) is too busy practicing his golf to offer him comfort or advice; the door to the basement where he sleeps keeps creaking on its own.

At a local bar, after having one too many Kahlua Mudslides and being punched in the face by a stranger, Ben meets Carla (Carol Kane), a septuagenarian widow whom he later recognizes as his old elementary school music teacher, Mrs. O’Connor. She gives him a ride home. The next day, she unexpectedly shows up at a Torah class he’s teaching to bored preteens, insisting that Ben help her prepare for a much-overdue bat mitzvah. (She never got to have hers because, as she explains, it was the ’60s and her parents were communists.) Ben finds the whole situation ridiculous, but Carla won’t take no for an answer.

As the scene progresses, their relationship grows closer and stranger. They (accidentally) stumble upon mushroom tea together while watching a VHS tape of Ben’s bar mitzvah; he takes to sleeping in his son’s old childhood bedroom. This fantasy recalls other films about intergenerational odd couples (Harold and Maude being the most obvious point of reference), but Between the temples“The real interest lies in the confusing roles we can play in each other’s lives—as stand-ins, doubles, or remakes—and the meanings we fumble in their interpretation, filtered through the familiar and well-worn themes of loss, midlife crisis, and Jewish identity. The screenplay (co-written by Silver and C. Mason Wells) could probably be schematized as a complicated web of dichotomies (teacher/student, parent/child, etc.), ghosts, role reversals, doubles, and rhymes. (There are, for example, two different and painfully awkward dinner scenes—one with Carla’s family, the other with Ben’s.)

Which means that if it wasn’t so often hilarious, Between the temples The film could pass for a psychological drama, exploring trickier territory once the rabbi’s daughter, Gabby (Madeline Weinstein), enters the picture as a potential romantic partner for Ben. Still, humor—sometimes acerbic, sometimes wacky—is integral to its worldview and its over-the-top, headstrong characters. While it avoids the ironic distance and meta-genre manipulation of some of his previous films (including films like Thirst Street, The Great PretenderAnd Actor Martinez), Silver’s style remains nonconformist, mixing eerie, compressive 1970s-style zooms and unexpected dolly moves with visual gags, exaggerated imagery, split-diopter shots, dreamy imagery and iris-ins, all beautifully filmed in Super 16mm by the ever-creative and ingenious cinematographer Sean Price Williams.

Beneath the zany jokes, the jokes, the nods to cinema and the occasional eccentricity lie questions that challenge us to define ourselves and to ask ourselves whether a community of faith can still represent something more important than gossip and the annual Holocaust bake sale. A lesser film might conclude that everyone is a little bit messed up and that’s okay, but Between the temples sincerely seeks the positive. A ceremony, however useless or absurd, nevertheless has meaning if it allows two people to feel less crazy and less alone.

Director: Nathan Silver
Writer: Nathan Silver, C. Mason Wells
With : Jason Schwartzman, Carol Kane, Dolly De Leon, Caroline Aaron, Robert Smigel, Madeline Weinstein
Release date: August 23, 2024