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Jellyfish is an odd title for a movie. These marine invertebrates are delicacies in many Asian countries, but more often are associated with sting and pain. But these amorphous shaped creatures can be beautiful as well – you just might want to keep your distance.

The film is told through the eyes of three very different women. We first meet Batya (sad-eyed Sarah Adler), a sullen waitress for a wedding catering service as she is dismissing her boyfriend. She wants him to move out and only after he has left, does she decide otherwise. Everything in her life is messy – her hair, her job her personal relationships. Especially her relationship with her divorced mother and father.

Her life briefly intersects with Keren (Noa Knoller), the bride who gets locked in the bathroom and breaks a leg while trying to return to the festivities. Because of her infirmity, the newlyweds are forced to cancel their plans in the Caribbean and instead end up at a crummy Mediterranean seaside resort. Not the sort of place that young women dream of when planning a romantic honeymoon.

The third is Joy, (Ma-nenita De Latorre) a Filipino woman who works as a home-health aide. All three lives converge at the wedding reception, where Joy is the guest of her patient. When that patient dies, she finds work with another elderly woman who resents her assistance, especially since Joy doesn’t speak Hebrew and they have trouble communicating. Malka (Zaharira Harifai) wishes her daughter could be her caretaker, but alas, her daughter is too busy rehearsing lines for a new-age rap version of Hamlet in which she plays Ophelia.

All conflicts are thrust into action when Batya, while meditating at the water’s edge stumbles upon a lost five year-old little red headed girl who is mute, wearing an orange and white stripe life preserver. Who is this little pixie?

The films journeys from one life to another, as in chapters in a book, as each try and live with the circumstances that have befallen them. Batya must deal with her parents and the new little person in her life. The newlyweds cope with their first (but probably not their last) crisis. And Joy rediscovers hope in the common language of humanity.

The stories are bittersweet, but told with a grand dollop of humor. We never actually meet Batya’s mother (who has a large presence in the film), but seeing her beautiful photograph on a poster at a bus stop is enough to elicit laughs.

One of the most important characters in the film, (unaccredited, of course) is the sea itself – blue, mysterious and ultimately rejuvenating. Metaphors abound! Batya’s roof leaks, the honeymooners encamp at a seaside resort and long for a balcony with a view of the sea and continuing with the mention of Ophelia (remember, she drowns in Hamlet).

The film has received wide recognition, especially after winning the Camera d’Or at the 2007 Cannes Film Festival. It has also been selected to screen at the prestigious Toronto and Telluride Film Festivals. 

One of the most unusual aspects of this film, is that it doesn’t mention, even hint at, Middle East tensions. It deals with genuine people (well, most of them are anyway) and their raw emotions – they just happen to reside in Israel. Sometimes we are so focused on the conflict there; we forget to explore their psyches which can be shaped by conditions other then war. It’s to the filmmaker’s credit that they didn’t even allude to the hostilities.

The film deviates from the usual Hollywood story line in that it doesn’t neatly wrap-up in the end. There has been a spate of films lately that follow disparate characters and we eventually experience the “Aha”! moment, when their lives intersect. Keret and Geffen skillfully take us on a detour away from that intersection and deposit us instead on the sandy beach. But the warning is clear; watch your step and be careful not to make contact with the jellyfish.

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