MenasheMovies like Menashe
- Key Features:
- Widower, Custody battle, Family drama, Cultural conflict, Tradition vs modernity, Father-son relationship, Social pressure
- Tone:
- serious, restrained
- Target Audience:
- Drama enthusiasts, Independent film viewers, Cultural exploration
- Emotional Arc:
- Longing → Struggle → Acceptance
Menashe

Within Brooklyn’s ultra-orthodox Jewish community, a widower battles for custody of his son.
Menashe
The trial story of Viviane Amsalem's five year fight to obtain her divorce in front of the only legal authority competent for divorce cases in Israel, the Rabbinical Court.

Penetrating the insular world of New York's Hasidic community, focusing on three individuals driven to break away despite threats of retaliation.

New York photographer Ronit flies to London after learning about the death of her estranged father. Ronit is returning to the same Orthodox Jewish community that shunned her decades earlier for her childhood attraction to Esti, a female friend. Their fortuitous and happy reunion soon reignites their burning passion as the two women explore the boundaries of faith and sexuality.

Miriam and Antoine have recently separated. While she’s willing to permit their 17-year-old daughter Josephine to decide living arrangements for herself, Miriam is desperate to keep her youngest, 11-year-old Julien, away from his father. But the magistrate rules in favour of joint custody, and suddenly the boy is thrown directly into the middle of an escalating parental conflict, where it seems inevitable that sides must be chosen.

When a hard-working single mother, Sara Diaz, has her children taken from her after she is suspected of injuring her son, Ally Fisher, a recent law school graduate, is assigned to represent her case before Judge Martha Schulman, a veteran of the Family Court System.

A grieving widower is drawn into a custody battle over his granddaughter, whom he helped raise her entire life.

A man providing overnight watch to a deceased member of his former Orthodox Jewish community finds himself opposite a malevolent entity.

A Jewish homicide detective investigates a seemingly minor murder and falls in with a Zionist group as a result.

A 12-year-old boy from Brooklyn tries to unite his half-Israeli and half-Palestinian family through cooking.

A peculiar neighbor offers hope to a recent widow who is struggling to raise a teenager who is unpredictable and, sometimes, violent.

A troubled family must face facts when tragedy strikes their son's desolate military post.

War widow Reiko rebuilds and runs the grocery shop in the house of her husband's family. Many years later, their business is threatened by a newly built supermarket and Reiko's in-laws plan to convert their small shop into a supermarket, to her detriment.

The story of a widower and his two sons, focusing on their complex and sometimes difficult relationships.

Zhenya and Boris are going through a vicious divorce marked by resentment, frustration and recriminations. Already embarking on new lives, each with a new partner, they are impatient to start again, to turn the page – even if it means threatening to abandon their 12-year-old son Alyosha. Until, after witnessing one of their fights, Alyosha disappears.

Two couples meet for a painful and raw conversation in the aftermath of a violent tragedy.

A widowed new dad copes with doubts, fears, heartache and dirty diapers as he sets out to raise his daughter on his own. Inspired by a true story.

Joseph and his two sons, Joachim and Ivan, form a close-knit family but fail to see that each one is losing control of his life. Joachim is supposed to be studying psychiatry but spends most of his time daydreaming about his ex-girlfriend, Ivan cannot fit in at school despite being very smart, and Joseph has secretly quit his job as a doctor and is trying to become a writer. While there is plenty of affection at home, all three are also, clumsily, searching for love...

Anna happily lives with her husband, their two boys, and Simon, 6 years-old, who was placed with her by the Social Care services when he was only 18 months. When Simon’s father decides that he is ready to take his son back with him, the family’s balance is at stake. Anna is torn apart: how could she possibly let go a of child who has always called her ‘Mom’?

A young father and his two children struggle to find harmony after his wife leaves them for another man.

A Bedouin village in Northern Israel. When Jalila's husband marries a second woman, Jalila and her daughter's world is shattered, and the women are torn between their commitment to the patriarchal rules and being true to themselves.

The twisted paths of three very different men brutally collide due to a chain of unspeakable murders: a grieving father who has been doomed to seek vengeance and a police detective who boldly crosses the narrow boundary between law and crime meet a religion teacher suspected of being the murderer.

When a young boy contracts a mysterious illness, his mother must decide how far she will go to protect him from terrifying forces in her past.

By God's order, Abraham was commanded to sacrifice his son Isaac on the mountain of Moriah. While traveling to the place of the sacrifice, alongside Isaac and two servants, Abraham is flooded with vivid memories from the years he and Sarah spent longing for the son they were promised—the son he must now lay upon the altar.

Florencia and Vicente are getting divorced. When both are promoted at their jobs, they will do anything in order to do not keep custody of their children.

A newly reunited father and son grapple with new beginnings after tragedy, but can they manage to fill the void left by a beloved wife and mother?

The new film by French director Cédric Kahn focusses on Philippe Fournier, a man who lives with his 2 sons, having decided not to give them back to their mother after she won custody of the children. The children Okyesa and Tsali must grow up in the shadow, hunted by the police but always free and on the move.

Sylvie lives with her two children whom she’s raising on her own. One evening, there’s an accident, and her youngest son is removed from her care. Sylvie must subsequently fight to get her son back and to keep herself afloat.

An eight-year-old boy is willing to do whatever it takes to end World War II so he can bring his father home. The story reveals the indescribable love a father has for his little boy and the love a son has for his father.

Struggling single father Jerry indoctrinates his son Joe into the sovereign citizen movement, teaching him that laws are mere illusions and freedom is something you take. But, as Jerry’s ideology consumes them, they are set on a collision course with a police chief who has spent his life upholding the rules that Jerry has spent his tearing down.

After years abroad in Italy, Shadi returns to his native Nazareth. But this is no spectacular homecoming. He's back somewhat begrudgingly to honour his "wajib" (or duty) to hand out invitations to his sister's wedding with his father. The simmering tension between the two — who are often stuck in a car, more often than not in traffic — builds, exposing the sometimes-comic chasms that exist between men who live in different worlds but share an unshakable bond.

James White is a troubled twentysomething trying to stay afloat in a frenzied New York City. As he retreats further into a hedonistic lifestyle, his mother's battle with a serious illness faces a series of setbacks that force him to assume more responsibility. With the pressure on him mounting, James must find new reserves of strength or risk imploding completely.

A supernatural love story that centers on two parents whose life together falls apart after their son dies. The man, now a successful lawyer, and the woman, now married and an author, get a chance at reconciliation ten years later.

Fahrije’s husband has been missing since the war in Kosovo so she sets up her own small business to provide for her kids, but as she fights against a patriarchal society that does not support her, she faces a crucial decision: to wait for his return, or to continue to persevere.

Ted Kramer is a career man for whom his work comes before his family. His wife Joanna cannot take this anymore, so she decides to leave him. Ted is now faced with the tasks of housekeeping and taking care of himself and their young son Billy.

Wife and mother Miriam begins a downward emotional spiral as her husband avoids their collapsing marriage by immersing himself in his 11-year-old daughter's quest to become a spelling-bee champion.

A married couple are faced with a difficult decision - to improve the life of their child by moving to another country or to stay in Iran and look after a deteriorating parent who has Alzheimer's disease.

In a rural Utah town, David, a father of four, grapples with his separation from wife Nikki as she pursues a new relationship.

When the wife of sports-writer Joe Warr dies of cancer, he takes on the responsibility of raising their 6-year-old son, and his teenage son from a previous marriage. As Joe rejects the counsel of his mother-in-law and other parents, he develops his own philosophies on parenting.

In the wake of a young Jewish girl’s disappearance, the son of a Hasidic funeral director returns home with his pregnant wife in hopes of reconciling with his father. Little do they know that directly beneath them in the family morgue, an ancient evil with sinister plans for the unborn child lurks inside a mysterious corpse.

Two brothers are trying to find out the truth from years ago. The whole town is against them.

The son of a rich businessman struggles to save his father's wealth after his demise. However, he faces many challenges when he becomes the sole breadwinner of his family.

1998, Nalchik. A Jewish family is in trouble: the youngest son and his bride do not come home, and in the morning, a ransom note arrives. The ransom is so high that the family is forced not only to sell its small business, but also to seek help from its fellow tribesmen.

Leo and Angela Russo live a simple life in Queens, surrounded by their overbearing Italian-American family. When their son finds success on his high school basketball team, Leo tears the family apart trying to make it happen.

A career driven professional from Manhattan is wooed by a young painter, who also happens to be the son of her psychoanalyst.

Even though Sam's father is hardly ever home because he is often away on business trips, he is able to connect with his son by teaching him how to pack a suitcase.

A middle-aged Orthodox Jew, Aaron, living and working in Jerusalem with his wife and children, meets a homeless 19-year-old student. Aaron offers to give Ezri work as his assistant at his family's butcher shop. The two men grow close and their attraction becomes sexual. Aaron must now confront his own sexuality, his feelings for Ezri, and his obligations to his family and faith.

A successful lawyer, with a new wife and infant, agrees to care for his teenage son from a previous marriage after his ex-wife becomes concerned about the boy's wayward behavior.

A young Hutterite boy must marry his late brother's wife who comes from outside the community.

A modern day train hopper fighting to be a successful musician and a single mom battling to maintain custody of her daughter defy their circumstances by coming together in a relationship that may change each others lives forever.

In 1980, Queens, New York, a young Jewish boy befriends a rebellious African-American classmate to the disapproval of his privileged family and begins to reckon with growing up in a world of inequality and prejudice.

A busy executive learns during a meeting that his mother may be dying and rushes home to her side. He ends up being his father's caretaker and becomes closer to him than ever before. Estranged from his own son, the executive comes to realize what has been missing in his own life.

Shuhei Hirayama is a widower with a 24-year-old daughter. Gradually, he comes to realize that she should not be obliged to look after him for the rest of his life, so he arranges a marriage for her.

The elderly Shukishi and his wife, Tomi, take the long journey from their small seaside village to visit their adult children in Tokyo. Their elder son, Koichi, a doctor, and their daughter, Shige, a hairdresser, don't have much time to spend with their aged parents, and so it falls to Noriko, the widow of their younger son who was killed in the war, to keep her in-laws company.

The sequel to "Yossi and Jagger" finds character Yossi (Ohad Knoller) leading a sad existence after losing his partner Jagger on the battlefield. A chance encounter with a middle-aged woman linked to his past shakes up his otherwise staid routine and sends him on a spontaneous pilgrimage to Tel Aviv. It is on the roads of southern Israel that he reignites the fire of his former self.

Xavier is a 40-year-old father of two who still finds life very complicated. When the mother of his children moves to New York, he can't bear them growing up far away from him and so he decides to move there as well.

An elderly couple journey to Tokyo to visit their grown children, only to find them preoccupied and self-involved.

Julia, a real estate agent, finds an enormous amount of money hidden in a dead man's apartment, a stroke of luck that will force her to face the wrath of the very peculiar inhabitants of the community, who will stop at nothing to get their hands on the money.

A young boy has lost his mother and is losing touch with his father and the world around him. Then he meets Hesher who manages to make his life even more chaotic.

An unsettling feeling overwhelms a small Hungarian town when two orthodox Jews arrive with a mysterious trunk. As residents begin to speculate on the purpose of the visit of these two strangers, order starts to crumble in town with some pursuing devious plans and others finding remorse in their hearts.

A divorced couple fights for the custody of their three children: neither of them wants it. Mom wants to leave them to dad, and vice versa.

Sarah tells Paul that she wants out of their marriage; the next day she disappears. A year later and Paul along with their children return to his childhood town to start anew after the loss of his wife and their mother.

A tough, Jewish ex-con just released from prison crosses a powerful drug dealer and former prison rival in his return to a life of crime.

In pre-WWII Holland, the penniless, illegitimate son of a powerful bailiff sets out to become a lawyer as he spends a lifetime struggling to prove his worth to his relentlessly spiteful father.

Troy and his young transgender son Joe are on the run from his conservative mother in the Montana wilderness, with a detective in hot pursuit.

Shuhei is leading a tough life. His alcoholic mother Akiko can only hook up with bad guys and order Shuhei to go get money from his disapproving grandparents instead of going to school. Except raising the little half-sister, his rock-bottom life seems to have no end.

A young man of Chinese-Cambodian descent dies, leaving behind his isolated mother and his lover of four years. Though the two don't share a language, they grow close through their grief.

David, a struggling comedy writer fresh off from breaking up with his boyfriend, moves from New York City to Sacramento to help his sick mother. Living with his conservative father and much-younger sisters for the first time in ten years, he feels like a stranger in his childhood home. As his mother’s health declines, David frantically tries to extract meaning from this horrible experience and convince everyone (including himself) that he's "doing okay.”

19-year-old Eric, arrogant and ultra-violent, is prematurely transferred to the same adult prison facility as his estranged father. As his explosive temper quickly finds him enemies in both prison authorities and fellow inmates — and his already volatile relationship with his father is pushed past breaking point — Eric is approached by a volunteer psychotherapist, who runs an anger management group for prisoners. Torn between gang politics, prison corruption, and a glimmer of something better, Eric finds himself in a fight for his own life, unsure if his own father is there to protect him or join in punishing him.

Matthieu is a 33 year old Parisian who finds out that the father he never knew has died and decides to go to his funeral in order to meet his two siblings in Quebec. But once in Montréal, he realizes that nobody is aware of his existence or even interested in it. He is alone, in hostile territory…

The loss of their young daughter threatens to destroy the love and faith of two married musicians.

Akira works as a lawyer. One day, he meets with his former client Rie, who asks Akira to perform a background check on her late husband Daisuke.

College student Danielle must cover her tracks when she unexpectedly runs into her sugar daddy at a shiva - with her parents, ex-girlfriend and family friends also in attendance.

When a young man learns that his overbearing father is having an affair, he tries to stop it, only to be seduced by the older woman as well.

An estranged family gathers together in New York for an event celebrating the artistic work of their father.

An 11-year-old boy and his neo-Nazi dad struggle with being outcasts in their suburban town.

Will Henry is a newly single graphic novelist balancing being a parent to his young twin daughters and teaching a classroom full of college students, all the while trying to navigate the rich complexities of new love and letting go of the woman who left him.

A successful lawyer returns to his hometown for his mother's funeral only to discover that his estranged father, the town's judge, is suspected of murder.

In a poor district of Edo lives a young samurai named Soza. He has been sent by his clan to avenge the death of his father. He isn't an accomplished swordsman however, and he prefers sharing the life of the residents, teaching the kids how to write etc. When he finally finds the man he is looking for, he will have to decide whether he follows the way of the samurai or chooses peace and reconciliation.

Each member of a family in Taipei asks hard questions about life's meaning as they live through everyday quandaries. NJ is morose: his brother owes him money, his mother-in-law is in a coma, his wife suffers a spiritual crisis when she finds her life a blank and his business partners make bad decisions.

Joris is trying to come to terms with his broken family relationships on the 10th anniversary of his father’s death when he meets the free-spirited, Yad. Also dealing with family issues, Yad has returned home to The Netherlands after living on his own. Joris and Yad spark an instant connection and decide they want to be more than “just friends,” but fear their families could threaten their relationship.

Ajami is an area of Tel Aviv in Israel where Arabs, Palestinians, Jews and Christians live together in a tense atmosphere. Omar, an Israeli Arab, struggles to save his family from a gang of extortionists. He also courts a beautiful Christian girl: Hadir. Malek, an illegal Palestinian worker, tries to collect enough money to pay for his mother's operation. Dando, an Israeli cop, does his utmost to find his missing brother who may have been killed by Palestinians.

In 1950s Pittsburgh, a frustrated African-American father struggles with the constraints of poverty, racism, and his own inner demons as he tries to raise a family.

The story of the Buckman family and friends, attempting to bring up their children. They suffer/enjoy all the events that occur: estranged relatives, the 'black sheep' of the family, the eccentrics, the skeletons in the closet, and the rebellious teenagers.

The prodigal son of a family in turmoil returns home to his French rural home to reconnect with his family and make sense of their dysfunctions.

A married couple on the verge of separation are leveled by the news their 18-year-old son committed a mass-shooting at his college, then took his own life.

Mukhtar Yusuf Ağa’s unregistered village in eastern Anatolia has been championed through letters to government officials, and his lost son İbrahim, rescued and registered by Father Hana, is finally returning at age 30 with his American love Jessica; the question is whether Tinne can become their true homeland.

After running away from his negligent parents, committing a violent crime and being sentenced to five years in jail, a hardened, streetwise 12-year-old Lebanese boy sues his parents in protest of the life they have given him.

A young girl buys an antique box at a yard sale, unaware that inside the collectible lives a malicious ancient spirit. The girl's father teams with his ex-wife to find a way to end the curse upon their child.

A couple facing marital problems after losing their child finds their life together further complicated by a mysterious visitor.

Smitten with a Jewish woman, a gentile asks his Jewish pal to advise him on how to act like a member of the community.

Ten-year-old Jack has to take care of his little brother, six-year-old Manuel, every day from the time he gets up to the time he goes to bed. When Manuel suffers an accident, their lives change forever.

Ryota Nonomiya is a successful businessman driven by money. He learns that his biological son was switched with another child after birth. He must make a life-changing decision and choose his true son or the boy he raised as his own.

Monty is a mechanic struggling to make ends meet as he raises his three young daughters. When the court awards custody of his daughters to his shady ex-wife, Monty desperately tries to win them back with the help of Julia, a beautiful, Ivy League-educated attorney. Monty and Julia couldn't be less alike, but a flame is ignited... touching off a firestorm of love and conflict.

Luigi has lived with his mother and little brother since their abusive father Franco left when he was 10. Now a young man brimming with rage, he joins a far-right gang in search of belonging, but Franco's return poisons everything.

After his young son dies from the negligence at a hospital, Harry Fertig takes matters into his own hands and kills the doctor, nurse and clerk responsible. Slick lawyer Roy Bleakie, looking only to win a case and not caring of the matters involved, is asked by Fertig's boss to defend him. Shocked to hear that his client wants to plead guilty, the case causes Bleakie to question his own morals by defending an honorable man.

Ma Chenggang, a wealthy man in Xihong City, worries that his eldest son is too spoiled to succeed him. Determined to raise a capable successor, he takes an unconventional approach. They conceal their wealth, moving the family to a dilapidated neighborhood, and maintain an illusion of poverty, so that his son could develop qualities such as hard work, knowledge, careful budgeting, physical fitness, and perseverance.

In the remote and undeveloped eastern Black Sea region, a six-year-old boy (Yusuf) wanders through the woods searching for his lost father, trying to make sense of his life.His father is a beekeeper whose bees have disappeared unexpectedly, threatening his livelihood. A bizarre accident kills the father.There is little dialogue or music in the film. The three main characters (Yusuf and his parents) are all fairly taciturn, and the soundtrack is filled out with the sounds of the forest and the creatures that live there.The environment is a recurring theme.

Time passes and tension mounts in a Florida police station as an estranged interracial couple awaits news of their missing teenage son.

