pioneer camp in the
Ukraine.
Not all of Mr. Astrachan's
village life is frightening or
dismal. While fear and
suspicion hang over
villagers like an execu-
tioner's blade, there's also
relief in the film's love,
warmth and bawdy humor.
Motl's wife, round and
pink-faced with a dirty ker-
chief matted to her sweat-
dripping face, crouches on
porch steps plucking
feathers off her sticky
chickens and swollen, red
fingers. Returning from a
business trip, Motl struts up
the muddy dirt path in front
of his house looking clean
and distinguished in a black
suit and sharp-rimmed black
hat. He's given a hero's
welcome as he boasts of his
dairy's new success.
Friends and family clap
their hands and slap Motl on
the back of his new shiny
suit as Motl unveils the new
logo on his dairy shingle:
-Two scantily clad women
with breasts as large as
cows' udders. "Even larger,"
one man jokes, poking his
friend.
Motl's wife laughs so hard,
she disturbs Motl's crisp,
white neck collar, discover-
ing physical signs of her
husband's philandering.
Jealous, she rails at him,
and the entire village gets
involved.
"The Jews and the peas-
ants were alike in many
ways," said Mr. Astrachan,
who cast non-Jews for the
film's Jewish roles and Jews
for non-Jewish roles. "They
worked and they played
hard."
Mr. Astrachan uses friend-
ships between the Jows and
their peasant neighbors to il-
lustrate this bond. Motl's
Russian neighbors, easily
incited, blame the Jews for
their material deficiencies
and accuse them of ruining
their homeland. Only Ivan,
the village elder, whose son
secretly marries Motl's
daughter, defends Motl and
Warns the Jews of impen-
ding doom.
Through a series of black-
and-white flashbacks, the
audience is drawn into
Motl's subconscious and
learns of his experience with
past pogroms. The scenes are
bloody and murky. Men,
women and children lay
broken inside houses. Motl is
a man on the run.. A
wanderer. He doesn't re-
main in one place very long.
Mr. Astrachan said Motl's
reaction is not disimilar to
his own during his 15-year
climb in the world of Soviet
theater. ❑
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