The Retrospective

by A. B. Yehoshua

  Manuel translates rapidly, with great enthusiasm, apparently enjoying the opportunity to show off the Hebrew he learned in the order. Moses is so swept up in his introduction that it seems there will be no time left to show the film.

  “To construct a plot, you have to choose a protagonist. Of course, it was possible to put the beadle of the synagogue at the center of the film, because it is he, more than anyone else, who maintains regular contact with the animal, especially at night when the animal is active and the synagogue is empty. But to render the story more meaningful, we preferred to make the rabbi the main character. We imagined a rabbi who had arrived in Israel with his flock from a distant Muslim land and established a synagogue where they could combine the old and the new. Then it turns out that a little animal, old and stubborn, had got there first, and its hideout is so ingenious that only if they destroy the building and put up a new one can they get rid of it. This, in short, is the issue: Do they destroy the synagogue, which was created with great effort and whose congregation may have scattered by the time it is rebuilt, or do they try to discover, in the sad, absurdist spirit of Kafka, some sort of coexistence between the worshippers and the animal? This is the heart of the matter, and I think I’ve already run on too long.”

  He tries to disappear into the audience before the translation is over, but the hoarse voice of the theoretician stops him, adding a detail that perhaps escaped the filmmakers and that Kafka himself was probably unaware of. In ancient Egypt, the mongoose was considered a noble and holy animal, perhaps owing to its ability to trap and kill poisonous snakes. It was therefore entitled to be embalmed along with the Pharaonic families.

  Moses is delighted. “Thank you, thank you. We didn’t know about ancient Egypt, and perhaps Kafka didn’t either. In any case, the historical dimension you have added to the animal can only deepen the understanding of our complex film.” And he motions to the projectionist to start the screening.

  3

  MOSES TRIES IN vain to recall the name, or at least the provenance, of the actor who played the rabbi in the film. He doesn’t appear in the credits because he had refused to have his name listed; during production, the animal was filmed separately and inserted in the editing room, and when the actor saw the final picture, with the full dialogue between him and the animal—whose role in the film transcended comedy and was anything but marginal—he complained that the animal had insulted him and demanded that his name be removed.

  By contrast, Moses well remembers the origin of the animal and even the lovely name given it by the soundman: Susana. One of Amsalem’s porters stalked her for a few days in the desert near Beersheba, trapped her, and brought her to the set. She was a large mongoose with a long hairy tail and proved to be timid, as in Kafka’s story, though at this moment, as she fills the screen and looks out with big red eyes, flashing her thin, sharp teeth, she makes a terrifying impression. To accustom her to the camera and to learn her habits, the director and cinematographer would visit her cage, feed her, talk to her gently, and play with her. They filmed her mainly at night. The porter, who became her trainer, would attach to her neck a transparent plastic leash, invisible on film, and tug it carefully, so her moves would seem natural and willful, to lead her from the holy ark to the grille of the women’s gallery and back. A few days later, in the editing room, they would include her among the faithful at prayer, generally filmed in daylight.

  But who played the rabbi? Moses can clearly see him in his mind’s eye even before he appears on the screen. A middle-aged man, tall and thin, in a black suit and hat, his dark eyes blazing. Might Ruth remember who he was? Was he just some amateur who happened to be around or a real actor?

  Trigano, in his loyalty to the neglected south of Israel, originally situated the synagogue in one of the forlorn immigrant towns, but Moses was sick of the arid landscape and insisted on moving the synagogue to the seashore, near the home of the cinematographer. A dry, simple story needs to be irrigated with images of water, and the sea looks wonderful on camera at all hours of the day.

  The first part of the film is preparation for Kafka’s parable. Members of the community are scattered among various synagogues but are nostalgic for the ritual flavor of their birthplace near the distant Sahara. And so they decide to establish a synagogue of their own. Lacking money and permits, they take over an abandoned building not far from the sea and pirate their electricity and water from a nearby nursery school. One day, a group of the men goes for evening prayers to the big synagogue in Tel Aviv, and at the end of the service, they steal from the ark two small Torah scrolls, then mask their identity by removing the red velvet Ashkenazic Torah covers and putting the scrolls into the round wooden cases typical of Sephardic communities. Only then do they send a delegation to a laborer planting trees by the roadside, their former rabbi, and implore him to serve again as their rabbi and cantor.

  And as the rabbi makes his entrance, so too does Kafka’s creature. On the very first Sabbath, the longtime resident of the building shows up during prayer. The animal’s agility conceals her cowardice, and the congregants are cowed by her fearsome appearance. They can’t turn to the municipal authorities to provide professional animal trappers, lest it be found out that the synagogue is hooked up illegally to the electricity and water of the nursery school. So the worshippers, young and old, decide to deal with the animal themselves.

  Here the screenwriter dipped his pen into Kafka’s story and added conflict and confrontation. In one camp are devout worshippers who demand the place be forcefully purged from the unclean beast, and in the other are the moderates, led by the rabbi, who wish to establish coexistence with the animal, in the spirit of Kafka. The film overflows with speechmaking and yelling, whose details Moses can’t remember and doesn’t try. He remains fixed on the rabbi, hoping to find a clue that will help him retrieve the actor’s name. Given his age then, he is probably no longer alive, but, dead or alive, the man has captivated Moses, and he tries to locate him in his memory. The actor dazzles him not merely with the excellence of his acting, but also with his delicate, fragile physicality. His face is dark and gentle, and his big black eyes shine with wisdom. For a moment he looks familiar. It seems the author from Prague, Kafka himself, has leaped out of his short story and turned into the rabbi of the film. How could I have let go of such a true actor? Moses despairs. I could have cast him in many complex roles in my later films.

  4

  HE GETS OUT of his seat and ducks down, dodging the beam of the projector as he makes his way in the dark to Ruth, then steers her away from the hall. “Who is the rabbi? I mean, who is the actor?” he pleads. “What was his name? How did we find him?” Although she too is impressed by the actor, whose performance invests grotesqueness with true spirituality, she cannot identify him either. “Did Trigano bring him to us?” “No,” she says. “If Trigano had brought him, I’d remember.”

  “What about Toledano?”

  “Toledano?” She fondly speaks the late cameraman’s name. “Maybe . . . because he would sometimes find you actors who were naturally gifted. But you can ask him only if you run into him in the afterlife.”

  “Afterlife,” he says. “That’s a new one for you.”

  She hesitates a moment, then breaks free and returns to the screening. But Moses doesn’t hurry back in. He walks around, looks at his watch. Tries and fails to open the door leading to the parade ground. Attempts in vain to hear the roar of the nearby ocean. Finally, lest he be accused of deserting his own work, he returns to the studio but remains standing by the rear entrance, monitoring the audience’s attention from behind.

  The foes of the animal have invited to evening prayers an irate ultra-Orthodox Jew, who is frightened as the creature stares at him from atop the holy ark. He demands that the synagogue be purified of the abomination and consecrated again, threatening the congregants with excommunication if his ruling is not heeded. It’s easy enough to invoke religious law, but as a practical matter, it is impossible to ex
pel the animal without killing her or destroying the synagogue, and the rabbi, who during the week continues to work as a laborer, refuses to harm her. At night, secretly and alone, he tries to discover her hiding place and to persuade her gently to leave his synagogue.

  Thus begin nightly conversations between the rabbi and the mongoose, the rabbi talking and the animal responding with her eyes. He leans toward her now, falling onto his knees to beseech her, trying to cajole the animal to leave the synagogue and go into the big natural world that awaits outside. Actually, he speaks only to the camera, and his hand reaching to touch her fur is stroking the empty air, while the animal listening to him speak is not a free being capable of escape but a creature held in place by the invisible plastic leash, attentive to the lens of the camera that evokes from her big, sparkling eyes the elegant sadness of one who understands the rabbi’s request to leave his synagogue but who cannot allow herself to abandon the Jews to their fate.

  Moses, standing in the rear, cannot see the faces of the audience. Two or three have left, and two others are whispering. There are also a few nodding heads, perhaps dozing, but the heads of the de Viola family, the old lady and her two sons, remain upright as, toward the end, the film gathers momentum.

  The congregants, despite their love for the rabbi, abandon the synagogue, one by one. Someone takes the stolen Torah scrolls, another dismantles the holy ark, still another disconnects the electricity and water, and they all go in search of a new place of worship.

  The building gradually reverts to a ruin, and the camera captures the waves licking its foundations. From time to time a few hikers visit the site. A pair of lovers spends a night there. The rabbi, still working with a hoe, no longer plants trees by the roadside but has been sent to dig wells in the hills. Toledano’s camera has apparently broken free now of both writer and director, following the rabbi who has lost his congregation as if his character holds the key to Kafka’s riddle. The film ends with a moment of rest for the laboring rabbi. He sits down among the rocks to eat his meager meal and watches as a large mongoose battles a snake. Thus hope is born from a strange, dark, and absurdist film, which Kafka could have barely imagined.

  5

  THE LIGHTS GO back on but are dimmer than before the screening, as if to allow people to make a getaway without revealing their reactions. But Moses is not interested in reactions. Yes, this is an immature film that was imposed on him, and it’s just as well that it was dropped from his filmography.

  He stands in the corridor waiting for the mother and her two sons and Ruth, who is with them. The theoretician walks by and shakes his hand firmly. If he happens to be a member of the prize committee, Moses thinks, I’ll be going back to Israel empty-handed. Manuel fondly grasps the director and says in Hebrew: “May your hands be strong, you have done a great thing—you have forced Kafka to be optimistic.” Juan reinforces his brother’s words with a nod and invites his guests to sit awhile in his room before dinner, the final item on today’s agenda.

  But Moses doesn’t want a dinner where conversation will inevitably make its way to the film just screened. “No,” he says apologetically, “attending a retrospective is harder for me than making a film, because I’ve lost control. If you want me clear-headed at tomorrow morning’s ceremony, please liberate me from this last supper and enjoy the company of my companion. With the aid of such an accomplished translator she will surely be able to explain anything that needs explaining.”

  They readily agree to his request and quickly arrange his transportation, which makes him suspicious. By ten o’clock he has arrived at the Parador, where he is surprised to find the lobby empty save for three guests, whose boisterous laughter suggests their intoxication. He suddenly realizes that his fear of negative criticism has condemned him to go to bed hungry, and tomorrow’s generous breakfast will not compensate for the splendid farewell dinner planned by the priest and his staff. He asks the reception clerk, a pretty young woman, if food might be available at this hour, which is after all not terribly late. She is sorry, the dining hall is closed, the cooks have gone home. But she herself could prepare for him something light.

  “Cold and simple food will satisfy me, señorita.”

  She leaves behind the math textbook that she had been immersed in. Before long she brings to his room a bottle of wine and a loaf of black bread with a large hunk of goat cheese. Moses sits in front of Caritas Romana, lustily chewing fresh bread and cheese, whose pungency he offsets with slugs of wine straight from the bottle. He removes his shoes but not his clothes before getting into bed.

  He glances at his watch; it’s past midnight and Ruth has not returned. There is of course nothing to worry about, she is under the aegis of two men of the cloth, but he keeps his clothes on, so if his presence is needed he can be prompt and presentable. He switches off the bedside light and turns over, like turning a page, in hopes that all his worries will vanish. But the new page in the book of sleep is more unsettling than the last one. For when he next opens his eyes he is startled to find the room lights dim, and himself naked under the blanket. By his side lies Ruth, quiet and content, leafing through the menu of the closing dinner.

  “Tell me,” she says to the man awakening beside her, “what scared you so much about the film that you passed up a great meal?”

  He pulls the blanket closer. He feels his head is glued to the pillow.

  “The truth? This time I was afraid of real anger.”

  “Anger over such an old film?”

  “All of them are my children”—the director sighs—“even the weak and the pathetic ones. Kafka wrote a story about that, in the first person, called ‘Eleven Sons,’ and the most miserable son is the one he loves best, though he would not want to entrust his life to him. Indeed, Kafka felt most of his works were flawed, but he did not destroy them and instead deposited them with a friend, asking him to burn them after he died. But the friend refused, and rightly so. If Kafka truly wanted to burn his works, he would have done so himself.”

  “But why did you think it would arouse anger? You know, the old man, the theoretician, gave his own little interpretation.”

  “Good or bad?”

  “An interpretation I didn’t understand. Any interpretation is good, no?”

  “What else happened at the dinner? Why was it so long?”

  “Spaniards are night people. They don’t get up at seven in the morning to listen to the news.”

  Moses laughs. “And the food? It really was special?”

  “A fabulous meal. Heavenly. What you missed tonight you’ll never have a chance to eat again.”

  “And they talked about me?”

  “Because you could do without them, they did without you. The cultural attaché from the Israeli embassy phoned from Madrid to apologize for not coming to tomorrow’s prize ceremony.”

  “So there’ll still be a prize?”

  “If that’s what they promised you.”

  “Maybe, between a fabulous course and a heavenly course, you remembered who played the rabbi?”

  “I tried, but I couldn’t remember. I also can’t figure out how we lost track of such a compelling actor.”

  “Maybe he’ll surprise us in the last movie tomorrow.”

  “No, he won’t be in tomorrow’s movie. That one I remember in every detail and will never forget.”

  “Meaning what?”

  “Juan told me which film was picked for the screening before the ceremony. Believe it or not, it’s The Refusal.”

  “The Refusal? Interesting.”

  “And this time they kept the original name.”

  “Trigano wouldn’t give up on this one, would he?”

  “Even though you gave it a different ending . . .”

  “Only for your sake . . .”

  “Partly for my sake.”

  She turns off the remaining light.

  In the darkness he feels the blanket on his nakedness, and presses on.

  “Who took my clothes off?”r />
  “You did. You took them off before I ever got back, but apparently you were woozy and lay here naked, with no blanket. I had to move you over and cover you. But that went smoothly. When you’re asleep, you’re a darling, easy to control.”

  6

  FROM THE DEEP well of time floats the face of a young schoolgirl, shaking him from slumber. The question of why she, the girl from north Tel Aviv, of all the characters in tomorrow’s film, is the first to burst into his memory will not let him rest, urging him out of bed. It’s four in the morning; the winter dawn is slow to arrive, yet he succumbs to his waking state. Stark naked, but trustworthy and careful, he checks on his companion, who is sleeping peacefully, then gathers up his clothing, gets dressed, puts on his coat, and pockets his passport and some paper money, but he leaves his hearing aids and wallet on the night table. Taking with him the pilgrim walking stick, he slips silently from the room.

  “If my metaphysics tire you and hurt your pocketbook,” Trigano told him after even the little art house in north Tel Aviv refused to show In Our Synagogue, “and you think our collaboration could use something more emotional and popular, the next screenplay will be about the travails of a young woman, and to give it an epic dimension we’ll start with her childhood. But to do that we need to find a girl who looks like her.”

  Moses decides to take the stairs down, because if anything should go wrong with the elevator, who would come rescue him in the middle of the night? The stairwell is unlit at this hour, but the stairs are comfortably carpeted, and on the walls curving around them hang pictures, unintelligible in the darkness.

  In the hotel lobby, two people doze in a corner in sleeping bags. Strange. Are they young backpackers who arrived late at night, discovered that the room they reserved was given to someone else, and were granted permission to sack out here and wait till morning? The cubbyholes behind the front desk are all empty of keys. The young woman who had brought the wine and cheese to his room is still on duty, and her face, fetching earlier that night, is now ever more radiant and unique. If I were called upon to direct a movie in Spain, thinks Moses, I would come back here and get the inexperienced reception clerk to play a small part in my film, maybe the part of a reception clerk. Even if her appearance in the film totaled just a few seconds, her beauty would be preserved in the archive for generations. He feels an urge to introduce himself to her as a film director and tell her that she may be unaware of her own beauty, but he resists. At that hour, such a compliment from a stranger could be construed by a young woman as harassment. Besides, could she believe that the old man standing before her is still active as an artist, planning for the future?