Dybbuks, Golems and Madness: The Hidden Gems of Jewish Horror

The Feast of Tabernacles is going on this week, and it is the last of seven Biblical Jewish feasts for the year. I figured with how much Israel has been in the news lately, I should do an article on Israeli horror films. 

At least, I originally wanted to write another article like the ones I’ve written so far, but to my surprise, the genre is less than 5 years old in Israel! Not only was Jewish horror close to non-existent in Israel until recently, it's remained fairly rare even in the West. 

I actually find this really surprising, but there are a number of reason why this may be the case.

Perhaps the most obvious is that the realm of the fantastic probably rings a bit hollow for a group of people historically well accustomed to actual horror. But then again, this has never stopped Japan, Germany, or many others from excelling at the genre. In fact, horror on screen as a byproduct of real world horrors is more often the rule, rather than the exception.

Another huge possibility is the very strong ethos of cold hard rationalism among Jewish people (not unlike the Russians!). They would be more at home in film noir, mystery and detective fiction than in horror. However dark it may get, boundaries do exist. There are laws and customs and rules, and they exist for good reasons. 

But a more complicated reason Jewish horror films don’t exist might be the complex relationship that Christianity and Judaism has maintained throughout the years in the West. 

The fire-and-brimstone storytelling mechanics from which modern American religious horror films are rooted are absurd by Jewish standards. A belief in Satan is problematic, as is the existence of a Hell. To a Jew, it’s as if this puts the burden of personal responsibility beyond one’s own physical existence. 

But that is not where horror really exists to a Jew. 

It exists on Earth, here and now, in the hearts of real people. Not being Jewish myself, I have to imagine Christian cosmology as depicted in horror films is rather cartoonish and adolescent by comparison. 

It should come as no surprise that the first horror films in Israel are psychological thrillers. 

And yet, I don’t think it will end there, because the potential for dark fantasy in the Jewish tradition is very vast. We're already starting to see an interest in these stories, even in the "mall horror" films I review here. 

Truth be told, Judaism has an incredibly compelling and expansive catalogue of stories, and they all make the Grimm’s brothers look like Dean Koonz and Danielle Steele. You may have heard of some of them, too. 

Dybbuks and golems are creatures that are linked to Jewish parables that actually mean something, and the pantheon of Jewish monsters doesn't end there. It includes the great sea monster Leviathan (upon which Moby Dick and many other stories was partially based), Behemoth, and a giant bird named Ziz whose wingspan is said to be capable of blocking out the sun.

From Dr. Suess' acid rock phase...

People in the West are familiar with these creatures because they've influenced much of our Judeo-Christian culture. But we tend to conveniently forget the source. 

There’s even an alternative origin story in Jewish mysticism involving a female demon named Lilith that was supposedly made at the same time as Adam, who may have even been his first wife. Fans of the show True Blood may recognize Lilith as being the original vampire for that show’s cosmology, yet the source of inspiration for this story is easy to overlook. 

It’s a hard knock life for a Jewish storyteller. Always having to provide a burnt offering on the invisible alter of Christian dogma in order to simply be heard. Even when the origin is stated as clearly Jewish, it appears in a story whose narrative only co-opts the story to reinforce a Christian narrative. 

It’s true, Jewish Rabbi’s are used in American religious horror films all the time like they are the token black guy on the writing staff of a TV show about inner city crime. They add authenticity to the proceedings, but their worldview is still ultimately “wrong” in the end. 

Maybe there’s an inner Jew in each Christian that just wishes he or she took their faith half as seriously, and need a little bit of reassurance. 

Rent-A-Rabbi. For when things get real. 

In any event, I’m hopeful that with the advent of indie film, this will change. It should be evident from the following list of films that the potential for great horror films coming out of the Jewish community still remains to be realized. At the very least, it is proving to be an avenue that studio execs in Hollywood are increasingly willing to explore for new ideas. 

One last note: anyone who wishes to explore this topic further should review the works of Mikel Koven. He’s a professor at the University of Worchester, and after studying various genres like Blaxploitation and Italian Giallo cinema, he has recently set his sights on Jewish horror film. He mentions a scene from American Werewolf in London (which I’m not reviewing here), that seems to suggest that the protagonist is indeed a Jew having a nightmare involving senseless violence from creatures dressed up as Nazis. Koven has actually already spoken about the topic of Jewish horror multiple times at Jewish film festivals, and if you are interested in learning more about it, you should definitely check him out.

This list is in no particular order, but I'm starting with the films of Israel.

Rabies (2011)
Directed by: Aharon Keshales and Davot Papushado

This film was billed as the first Israeli horror film, and it’s a pretty darn good first attempt.  It demonstrates the ease with which every person can become prone to violent rage, given the right circumstances. Not only that, but while this film borrows most of its plot mechanics from American survival horror, it remains unpredictable and largely character-driven until the very last scene. 

Even though the basic plot is familiar - young people wind up trapped in an unfamiliar and isolated environment - the story plays out more like Shakespearean tragedy, with an extra dose of caffeine to heighten the mania. The stroke of genius of this film is in the fact that everyone in the film kills at least one other person, except for one: the “killer.” That’s right. The person set up the be the main antagonist is actually shot with a tranquilizer in the first act, and doesn’t reappear until the credits roll. 

Not that this will spoil the film, though, because watching each person become triggered by one impulse or another is nothing short of mesmerizing. Everyone in the film becomes a dangerous person to be around, and there is no supernatural appeal presented to explain it. And that is just terrifying.

Big Bad Wolves (2014)
Directed by: Aharon Keshales and Davot Papushado

Big Bad Wolves is a film about uncertainty, and it goes much darker than the first film by the filmmakers. By a lot. It reinforces the worldview of their previous film, Rabies, and suggest that one can lose his or her soul in the pursuit of justice. It is as dark as one can get, and as comical as one can get when being that dark.

After all, the story features the torture by a vigilante of a man believed to have mutilated a little girl. Much like the French film Martyrs (which I reviewed on this blog), it suggests that there is something perverse in the human condition that drives one to desire this sort of retribution, even when the guilt of the victim remains unclear. 

And yet, you would never think that a film with this sort of premise would include moments that are just plain hilarious. When the father gets involved in the torture with his son, they actually start to bond. Throughout the torture, he stops to digress with silly memories, and it's as funny as it is twisted. It’s a very odd film overall, and it cannot be described. American audiences will not likely be used to its tendency to undermine every expectation, but it’s well worth it for those with an open mind and a strong stomach.

Cannon Fodder (2013)
Directed by Eitan Gafny

Cannon Fodder is not a particularly good film, I’ll be honest. As far as zombie films go, it is pretty mediocre. The special effects are awful, the acting doubly so, and the premise couldn’t be more infantile as far as zombie convention goes. It is also very predictable, and not really scary at all.

On the other hand, there is something special about seeing the zombie apocalypse originate as a result of biological warfare between the Israelis and the Palestinians. As sloppy as this script was, and as terrible as its execution was, I believe there is potential for a truly original idea to come out of this area of the globe with respect to zombies. But this film isn’t it. And that breaks my heart because zombies.

Goldberg and Eisenberg (2013)
Directed by: Oren Carmi

This is by far my favorite of the Israeli horror films. It features a genuinely scary premise and a nearly perfect execution of that idea. A lonely man tries to find a woman to connect with, and as he does, he is tormented by a bully that stalks and harasses him. The police don’t take his pleas seriously, and when his new girlfriend finally decides she wants no part in it, he has to take matters into his own hands. 

Some of the scenes with Eisenberg (the bully) go on for an uncomfortably long time, and the parallels between the lonely Goldberg (the protagonist) and Eisenberg do not seem to be accidental. It is almost as if Eisenberg represents what Goldberg could be, if he was less sane. They are not that different. But this film is nothing like The Cable Guy. 

There is so much more going on here, and the darkly comic script is so tightly written that everything that happens follows naturally from what came before it. It is well worth a look for anyone looking to study a good psychological thriller. It really is like many critics have said: it is like Israel’s answer to the Coen brothers. 

The Possession (2012)
Directed by: Ole Bornedal

This Sam Raimi-produced flick deserves mention on this list because of the Jewish tale upon which it’s based. There seems to be mixed feelings regarding whether it treats the Jewish legend fairly, or if it is merely an appropriation of yet another Jewish story as retold in a WASP-y setting of American suburbia. 

The criticism is fair. The film works best when it is sticking to the premise that what is really going on is a young girl is experiencing puberty at the same time that her parents are divorcing. A daughter can indeed act as though she is possessed under these circumstances, and the brilliant execution of the film its Danish director really seems to keep the emotional center alive all the way to the end.

On the other hand, I’m sure no one in America would have ever known what a dybbuk was before seeing this film, or that it had anything to do with Jewish folklore. Hauntings seem to be a universal movie monster, which is why we see ghost stories all over the world. But this Jewish legend historically focuses on the reunion of a recently lost loved one with the body of the loved one left behind. This very old Jewish parable is about learning to let go and not hold on to loss forever, because it can make one spiritually sick. 

For this reason, this film works best when it reinforces the parallel between a young girl possessed by a dead creature and a daughter that desperately hopes in vain for her parents to get back together. It has a better story and better characters than any of the Insidious or Conjuring movies have. This is not a perfect film, but is is one of the better attempts at the possession sub genre. 

The Unborn (2009)
Directed by: David S Goyer

This is an exceedingly silly film (not in a good way), and I hesitate to include it at all. There is very little that this film does right. The metaphysics are confusing, so you don't know what the stakes are. The movie isn't even sure what kind of movie it wants to be. 

As far as the Jewish angle goes, the heroine's grandmother is a Holocaust survivor, but this is presented more like cheap, exploitative window dressing. Also, the dybbuk in this film merely wants what the demon from the Insidious movies and all the other similar movies want: a physical body. Of all the angles to the dybbuk myth, these American movies seem to want to pick the most basic and least interesting. It is a real shame. 

The one thing this film tried to do that I really might have liked, had it pulled it off, was an exorcism that seems to be cobbled together based on various mystical traditions. The stereotypical Rabbinical authorities also don't make an appearance. Instead, this exorcism is sort of an admittedly amateurish affair, and this should have made the final exorcism more interesting and exciting. But it wasn't. 

The Golem (1920)
Directed by: Paul Wegener and Henrik Galeen

Although this film was made in Germany by a Catholic, it is still one of my favorite horror films of all time. It is a retelling of one of the most famous Jewish legends: the resurrecting of a golem by Rabbi Judah Loew ben Bezalel, one of the most famous Jewish scholars of all time. Whether or not there is any veracity to this legend, or whether the legend was even Jewish in origin, remains a mystery.

The Rabbi uses Jewish mysticism to resurrect an inanimate creature made out of clay, and although he originally does so to save his own people, it ultimately pulls a Frankenstein and goes on a murderous rampage. This might be a significant deviation from the original story’s intended purpose, though. 

Original mentions of a “golem” in the Talmud, the Bible and other places suggest that a golem simply referred to any unfinished or unformed creature. As with many Jewish stories, this German depiction of a creature from Jewish folklore is more menacing than originally intended, and with a different message. I must remain ignorant as to whether it can be considered “Jewish” in its own right, but I think it is a good film and worth a look.

*****

A few more flicks to check out...

As I mentioned before, Mikel Koven provides a more thorough examination of Jews and Judaism in horror films. Here are a few other films to look at:

Der Dybbuk (1937) - A Polish film based on a play of the same name. It supposedly portrays a more genuine version of the dybbuk tale, where a recently deceased lover is resurrected in the body of the surviving lover. I would comment further, but sadly I have yet to find a copy that is in English. 

American Werewolf in London - A superb, oscar-winning film featuring a protagonist that is very likely to be a Jew. As mentioned previously, his nightmare sequence contains evidence that his family is Jewish (including a menorah on the mantle in the background). 

God Told Me To - Presents religious horror in the form of a detective story. Serial killers continue to utter the words, “God told me to,” after every killing, and one cop slowly goes mad trying to figure out why. It is never so much as hinted at that it is Satan, as one may expect. 

Pi - Koven doesn’t mention this film, but I think it counts. It shows the downward spiral into madness of a mathematician that is being pursued by both a wall street company and a group of Jews because of a 216-digit number in his head. The examination of the Hebrew language in mathematical terms, and of Kabbalah, is fascinating.