A Chat With Ayelet Menahemi, Director of Israel’s International Feature Selection ‘Seven Blessings’ [VIDEO]

How many of us wish we could confront a family member or two and demand an apology for a past wrong?

Marie (Reymonde Amsallem, in a performance that in a just world would make her an international star) has just married Dan (Eran More). They live in France but have journeyed to Israel to celebrate with Marie’s estranged Moroccan-Jewish relatives via the tradition known as the seven blessings where newly betrothed couples celebrate for seven meals with family (and friends) over the course of a few days.

Only these particular gatherings are fraught with tension, jealousies, and angst, most of it coming from the fact that when Marie was two years old she was gifted by her mother, Hana (Tikva Dayan) to Hana’s sister, Grazia (Rivka Behar), since Hana had an abundance of children and Grazia was barren. Wildly, this was custom among Moroccan Jews (and it turns out done in other cultures). Now, 40 years later, Marie still harbors much pain and rage and seeks an apology. Alas, when do family members ever offer up apologies easily?

The sincere, nuanced screenplay is by two of the actors in the film, Amsallem and Eleanor Sela, who plays Marie’s older sister. They are cousins in real life and had discovered this mind-boggling custom actually occurred in their own family.

The movie is lovingly and deftly directed by award-winning filmmaker Ayelet Menahemi, who has made several narrative and documentary features including It’s About Time and Noodle.

Seven Blessing swept the Ophir Awards (Israeli’s Oscars) including wins for Best Picture, director, lead actress and supporting actress (Dayan) and screenplay. This is the country’s International Feature Oscar submission.

Israel has been nominated for 10 Oscars in the International Feature category but has never won—a record.

Awards Daily had the pleasure of a zoom chat with Ayelet.

Seven Blessings is seeking distribution.