‘Between the Temples’ Review: Jason Schwartzman and Carol Kane Navigate Religion, Purpose, and Life in Nathan Silver’s Screwball Comedy | Sundance 2024

Ben Gottlieb (Jason Schwartzman) is a cantor at a temple, but he’s hardly the best fit for his job at the moment because he just can’t sing. Rabbi Bruce (Robert Smigel) doesn’t seem to mind since he enjoys singing himself, and Ben has had a hard year. His wife died, and he’s now living at home with his moms (Caroline Aaron and Dolly De Leon). Simply put, he’s a mess. When he runs out of services one night and picks a fight with someone at a bar who’s laughing at him for being “the saddest motherfucker in here,” he reencounters someone from his childhood: his music teacher Mrs. O’Connor (Carol Kane). It turns out that the recently widowed Carla, maiden name Kessler, is keen to do something she’s never done before – have an adult Bat Mitzvah – and she’s sure an unconvinced Ben is just the right person to teach her.

Between the Temples comes from filmmaker Nathan Silver, who describes the film as a screwball comedy inspired by the likes of Toni Erdmann. There’s definitely an air of unseriousness to everything about it, like how the rabbi golfs into a shofar in his office, and exaggerated tropes like Ben’s moms trying desperately to set him up, getting him to agree to see a doctor only to have a single plastic surgeon show up at the door seconds later. It’s all fun and great fodder for comedy, even if it’s not terribly complex or deep.

Schwartzman has a particularly unkempt and disheveled look in this role, as if Ben is uncomfortable in his own skin. Even before he fails to sing in front of the congregation, he doesn’t seem poised or confident up on the bimah podium where he’s surely been on a regular basis prior to what the rabbi describes as an “extended sabbatical.” It’s also not clear that he actually misses his wife since he refers to her as an alcoholic writer, and his reluctance to be set up with Gabby (Madeline Weinstein), the rabbi’s daughter who is apparently a mess herself, feels like it has less to do with some loyalty to his dead wife and more to do with feeling lost and aimless in his own life. 

The key relationship of this film, much to Ben’s Jewish mothers’ chagrin, is the one that builds between Ben and Carla. While they’re initially quite hostile to each other, they soon develop a mutual respect driven by their commitment to what they’re doing. They ask questions that prompt thoughtfulness on the part of both teacher and student, and Ben proves himself early on when Carla forces him to repeat what she has just said because she doesn’t think he was listening and he’s able to relay it all back to her. Schwartzman and Kane are a fun pair, and they handle both comedic and dramatic material well together.

The undeniable MVP of the film, however, is De Leon. Surely close to an Oscar nomination in 2022 for Triangle of Sadness, De Leon has already been working steadily since then, with another movie, Ghostlight, also at Sundance this year. She perfectly captures the image of the overbearing Jewish mother who is fully aware of just how much she’s meddling and has no intention of apologizing for it. She’s determined and hilarious, and also boasts the most accurate and impressive mastery of Hebrew of anyone in the cast. Though her part is smaller, Aaron is a wonderful partner for her, playing a character who’s much less like her mother-in-law from The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel than De Leon’s is. 

A soundtrack of light Hebrew music runs throughout the film, giving it a somewhat buoyant, dreamy feel. The incorporation of Jewish traditions may entice some audiences, though those hopefully for a true-to-life representation of Judaism will find multiple glaring holes, like Ben’s insistence that he keeps kosher and can’t have meat and dairy together when he knows full well the meat itself isn’t kosher, as well as fidelity to other traditions like not taking photographs on the sabbath that don’t match the religious observance level of these characters. But for general audiences, the dose of Judaism should be just right, even with a handful of inside-baseball Hebrew references that are left untranslated.

It’s actually the minor miscommunications that deliver the biggest belly laughs. When Ben tells Carla that he’s a cantor, she responds, “I’m an Aquarius,” before he clarifies his initial statement with a more deliberate pronunciation. Temple Sinai being misheard as “Temple Cyanide” is another such moment that serves as one of the script’s highlights. An extended scene in the film’s third act at a Shabbat dinner is sure to give audiences much to laugh about, though it’s also quite uncomfortable for everyone involved since things start out awkwardly and only continue to get worse. Silver described it as the essential Jewish meal: total chaos.

Like its protagonist, this film doesn’t always feel like it knows where it’s headed. The final scene in particular feels somewhat unfinished, not fully addressing the various subplots. There remain unresolved storylines, but that may just be the message of the film, which begins with someone who needs to assert that she’s not too old to do something most people couldn’t picture her having the stamina to do. Not everything can be tied up neatly in a bow, and this film still manages to have plenty of fun along the way.

Grade: B

Between the Temples is playing in the U.S. Dramatic Competition at the 2024 Sundance Film Festival.