Depiction of religious Jews in the film
What do viewers feel about the depiction of religious Jews in the film? Most of the religious men in the film are depicted as haredim - ultra-orthodox super religious people that are not always nice people. They try to "trick" a group of the Ethiopians into ritual conversion (taking a drop of blood from the penis followed by immersion in a ritual bath) when young Schlomo is taken for what seems to be a medical exam, followed by the wild scene of escape. In real life, they have made some deeply regrettable religious decisions and public statements about who is and isn't a Jew, and other issues that have affected many peoples lives in a less than positive way.
The two exceptions are "hero" characters: the Ethiopian religious leader that we finally learn has known Schlomo's secret all along - and still helped and mentored him on a path toward Judaism - and the rabbi that Schlomo interacts with as a teenager (at his bar mitsva, other scenes, and is at the wedding). By the way, that's some great chanting of the Torah in the bar mitsva seen - the actor clearly knows his stuff.
As a religious (American) Jew that believes I'm a balanced kinda guy, I'm rarely comfortable with a common dichotomy of Israeli perspectives on Jews: they are either massively "religious" with black hats and long beards, or not at all except for a small number of life cycle events (births, b'nai mitsvoth, marriages, deaths). This depictions ignores a huge number of Jews that fall in between those extreme positions, including many Israeli "Modern Orthodox" and Masoti/Conservative groups. Perhaps it's more difficult to make characetures out of less visually identifiable religious Jews. We largely dress the same as non-religious Jews (except for extreme female fashion that often borders on porn), have no trouble interacting with non-religious Jews. We try to find a way to live a life among many different types of people while still keeping a path defined by the ethics and morals of the written holy books in our tradition as interpreted over time by learned leaders. I like the idea that being Jewish has nothing to do with skin color and everything to do with the content of a man's character (now, who said that?) and one's positive actions toward God, the world we live in, and the other people who live here too.
-N