The Matchmaker

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  • Opened August 17, 2012 (NY)
  • 1 hr 52 min
  • NR
  • The time is 1968. The summer of love has come and gone in the United States, and Israel has just come out of the Six-Day War. Teenaged Arik dreams of becoming a war hero as he grows up in a quiet, respectable Haifa household, and like the rest of the inhabitants of the city, he prefers not to talk about his family’s past as Holocaust survivors. Arik meets the daunting and affably sad matchmaker Yankele Bride, a childhood friend of his father’s from the old country and a fellow survivor, and is swept into a job as his assistant. Arik relishes his days working for Yankele in the so-called Lower City, a portside neighborhood bustling with sailors, outcasts, prostitution, gambling, contraband and movie theaters. Yankele sees matchmaking as his life’s mission, and “specializes in special people,” who he fears are at risk of a life without love.
    *Note: In Hebrew with English subtitles. Full synopsis

  • Cast: Adir Miller, Maya Dagan, Don Navon, Dror Keren, Tuval Shafir, Bat-El Papura, Eli Jaspan, Yael Leventhal, Yarden Bar-Kochva, Neta Porat, Kobi Farag
  • Director: Avi Nesher
  • Genres: Art House/Foreign

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Critics say Go
69 out of 100
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Critic Reviews

83
The Playlist
| Mark Zhuravsy

The Matchmaker is at heart an unexpectedly complex film about love, but also an examination of Israel in flux, a country with one foot in the past and another in the future – a weight that may never fully vacate Israeli shoulders. Read full review

80
Village Voice
|

An old-fashioned Mediterranean coming-of-age story set in the young heart of the Levant, The Matchmaker combines the tender tone of a film like "Cinema Paradiso" with a clear-eyed, street-level vantage on Israel's summer of the Six-Day War. Read full review

80
Variety
|

This look back at late-'60s Haifa makes for strong, accessible, character-driven drama. Read full review

80
Los Angeles Times
| Kenneth Turan

It sounds like a throwback to an earlier, more traditional style of Israeli filmmaking but it instead provides a view of that country that's as satisfyingly eccentric and unexpected as anything we've seen. Read full review

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A scene from "The Matchmaker."