What a beautiful movie!

Stylish but barely mediocre overall

There are moments that feel comical, some horrific, and some downright inspiring but the tonal shifts hardly matter as the end results come to a film that's perfect for this time.

It is a whirlwind of delight --- attractive actors, stunning couture, spectacular sets and outrageous parties.

This movie belongs to my favorite category -- the movies that make you think. So, naturally, worth watching. I was surprised to see that a lot of reviewers were focusing on the accuracy of details and their perceived misrepresentation of the orthodox Jewish community by the creators of the film. To me those things are almost irrelevant. The plot would hold true for any situation, in which people are forced to choose between personal happiness and expectation of certain behavior their immediate family, society, etc. put on them. This movie portrays very well the ridiculous cruelty of the artificially created predicaments, and our inability to clearly determine right from wrong, when we are truly tested and must search within ourselves to find the right path. I really don't want to pick it apart and critique the cast and crew in this review for the simple reason that the movie, as a whole, completely delivers and is, in my opinion, excellent. If I had to find other movies that (in a way) deal with a similar dilemma and had a similar impact on me, I would pick Brokeback Mountain and The Reader.

It is obvious that those who dislike this film are quick to say it is an inaccurate portrayal of Ultra-Orthodox Judaism. This is somewhat like the way that many Moslems are quick to defend Islam at its worst. Apparently too many Jews (and non-Jews worried about being called anti-semitic?) feel that criticism of this most fundamentalist form of Judalism is a terrible thing. It's a good thing and the more criticism there is the better it is. There are other forms of Judaism. There are also many Jews who are not fans of religion (as in my case). There are too many films by Jews and non-Jews that tend to equate being Jewish with being Orthodox and Ultra-orthodox. This includes the obnoxious use of Hassids at the beginning of the credits for "Schindler's List". Then there is the silliness of "A Stranger Among Us". "A Price Above Rubies" was an improvement. "Kadosh" represents the next step. Well done technically. Beautifully acted. It's harrowing but certainly not boring. (This review is by June of joejune.)

This is a superb movie -- reminiscent of A Pearl Among Rubies in its depiction of a woman's plight in the Orthodox Jewish community. It may, however, be a more difficult film than a Pearl Among Rubies for a non-Jew to understand or credit. Kadosh focuses on the situation of two sisters in a religious culture that expects women to produce children and to devote all their energies to raising them and to caring for their husbands while the husbands spend full time studying Torah and Talmud. One of the sisters has been married for 10 years but has never conceived and is therefore considered a failure in her primary responsibility as a wife (though it's quite possible that the husband is the one who is sterile) Her younger sister is betrothed and soon married to a man she does not love and who is mainly interested in impregnating her, not in making love to her. I won't spoil the plot by spelling out what happens to them. I'm sure this will seem unbelievable to those who have never encountered the Ultra Orthodox communities [stress the plural; they are not identical] in Israel. Could this story happen? Among the more intransigent sects? I'm inclined to think so. Although the problem for the woman in A Pearl Among Rubies (Renee Zellweger -- the first time I ever saw her), the story is easier to comprehend, both because it is in English and because it is far more external and filled with incident than Kadosh. It is also more sensational and somewhat less believable. What makes Kadosh so effective is the silences, which often endure for minutes, leaving the viewer to imagine the thoughts of the characters on screen. The most serious defect of the film for those who don't speak Hebrew is the difficulty, especially on a small screen, of reading the subtitles (often set against a light background). That prevents it from being a 10. I give it a 9.

A great story and well-shot. But at times, things move too slowly for my taste. This inherently feminist critique is also the type of film that begs for theological critique, because the concerns of the depicted society are only understood within the context of their theology, an understanding of the documents they follow and where they and their subsequent traditions originate. Why can the women not stand up or fight back at all? Are they really that powerless? If they studied as the men did, they could, potentially (I have studied both the Torah and the Talmud as well as Hebrew and Jewish customs). What is the perspective of the filmmaker? An ex-Jew most likely? And what alternatives are there? This anti-orthodox, anti-tradition social problem film is a gripping story, even without background details. Well worth seeing.