Sholem Aleichem: Laughing in the Darkness

Directed by Joseph Dorman

United States • 2011 • 93 mins.

Showtimes & Past Screenings

Dorman’s engrossing film tells the tale of a rebellious genius who created an entirely new literature. Plumbing the depths of a Jewish world locked in crisis and on the cusp of profound change, Aleichem was not just a witness to the creation of a new modern Jewish identity, but one of the very men who shaped it. “A rich . . . modern history of East European Jewry. . . Conjures the look and vitality of shtetl life so vividly you can almost . . . smell the pungent aromas of the cooking.”—Stephen Holden, New York Times.