Disobedience begins with an Orthodox Jewish rabbi giving a homily about choice. Just as the rabbi finishes speaking, he collapses and dies. When his daughter Ronit (Rachel Weisz), a famous photographer living in New York City, hears of his passing, she returns to London and the isolated community she left decades before.
She ends up staying with her two best childhood friends, who’ve since married each other. The husband, Dovid (Alessandro Nivola), is her father’s successor and the wife, Esti (Rachel McAdams), is her first love. Time apart hasn’t dimmed Ronit and Esti’s attraction and Disobedience is driven by their struggle to choose between their feelings or the religion that separated them.
As the director of last year’s Best Foreign Language Film Oscar winner, A Fantastic Woman, Sebastiàn Lelio is no stranger to stories about grieving queer women. And while Ronit is certainly sad about her father’s death, the true tragedy is the lost time between her and Esti — at least that’s how Weisz and McAdams make you feel. The air practically crackles with electricity every time they look at each other. As Ronit watches Esti light candles for shabbos, Weisz stares at McAdams with a mix of tenderness and half-lidded desire that conveys exactly how well they used to know each other. McAdams, meanwhile, makes Esti seem both swooning and wounded by Ronit’s sudden reappearance. She gives the impression that Esti is just waiting until they are alone and when they finally are, the result delivers on that sexual tension.
Those scenes will inevitably become a big talking point, but Disobedience isn’t as concerned with passion as its consequences. Dovid is the focus of much of that concern. He represents not just the personal toll Ronit and Esti’s attraction represents, but the religious. The film plays coy about how much he knows about what happened between Ronit and Esti, but Nivola conveys a sense of goodness about Dovid that keeps him from becoming just some villainous obstacle to their love. He represents the world and traditions Ronit left behind and by extension, he makes the Orthodox Judaism she rejected more nuanced and sympathetic.
The novel’s author, Naomi Alderman grew up in an Orthodox Jewish community and Rebecca Lienkiewicz’s script maintains that sense of authenticity. The film somehow manages to both critique and appreciate the community. Though Ronit left decades before, that distance also allows her to take comfort in its rituals in a way that Esti–who’s still oppressed by them — can’t.
When Ronit first learns her father died, she seems dazed. It’s not until she tears her clothes (a tradition in Judaism meant to express anguish over death) that she seems able to exhale. The same is true when she returns to London. She’s clearly uncomfortable seeing so many judgmental family members and acquaintances, but she also closes her eyes when she tries a bit of food at the shiva, as if it’s the best thing she’s ever tasted.
In the same way that the Coen Brothers’ A Serious Man made God feel undeniable and motivated, there are moments in Disobedience that feel like part of some divine plan. Like the moment when a light flickers on over Ronit and Esti as they embrace in what they think is a secluded spot. However, too many other moments of happenstance feel like convenient writing. Take the scene where Ronit and Esti — alone for the first time since the former’s return — are standing in Ronit’s childhood home and when she turns on the radio, The Cure’s “Lovesong” just happens to be playing. Sure, the opening lyrics perfectly describe their relationship (“Whenever I’m alone with you/you make me feel like I am home again”), but there’s something cheesy in how on-the-nose the moment is.
Thankfully, there are much better musical moments throughout. Composer Matthew Herbert’s score is full of portent and passion, but his best moment comes as the film starts. Over a black screen comes a blast of horns so clear and loud that one expects to hear the walls of Jericho crumbling in the distance after. The film’s look is similarly impressive. The world Lelio and cinematographer Danny Cohen create is harshly realistic, with none of the escapist flourishes of A Fantastic Woman. The community Ronit returns to is harsh and the subdued, almost pallid look makes the moments when Ronit and Esti’s passion breaks through that gloominess more stark.
There is something perverse and kinky in the way Disobedience plays on the fact that Orthodox Judaism forbids physical contact between unmarried men and women, but it’s unregulated amongst the women—except in the one way that matters to Ronit and Esti. The film exploits that tension for all it’s worth, but it also isn’t afraid to consider that the traditions that keep the women apart don’t necessarily mean their love is repellant in God’s eyes. The film is ultimately ambiguous on religion itself and ambiguous on where the characters’ lives lead next. What isn’t unclear, though, is that Disobedience is great.
Rating: 9/10
