‘This place is the essence of everything that’s f—ed up about humanity. Doesn’t that bother you?” Adam (Leib Lev Levin) asks his wife, Tamara (Victoria Rosovsky), in Real Estate: A Love Story, as they search for a new apartment in Haifa after they’ve been priced out of Tel Aviv.
Tamara, who is very pregnant, replies, “Not at the moment. Can we go up, Che Guavera?” and rings the buzzer.
The movie, which won the Israeli Feature Film Competition at the Haifa International Film Festival this year, is funny, entertaining, and very deep all at once – a feat that is almost impossible to pull off.
Director/writer Anat Malz has made an amazing debut film, which deals with a particularly Israeli issue: a couple wanting to go on living in Israel’s hipster hub but being forced into a more realistic alternative. This will also resonate with audiences all over the world because there are young couples getting priced out of apartments in New York, San Francisco, Paris, London, and chic cities everywhere.
What really makes the film interesting, and the reason that so many will relate to it, is that it both is, and isn’t, about apartment hunting; it’s what’s behind apartment-hunting, the need to find a place to live in every sense of the world, and the gap between our dreams and aspirations and our actual lives.
That’s why apartment-hunting is so emotionally fraught, because it’s like playing a game where the rules keep changing, where (very often) you’re starting at a disadvantage because of your low budget, and if you lose you could be out on the street, or forced to couch surf with the family that made you want to move out in the first place.
When a young couple has to move because of a pregnancy – an extremely common occurrence – it can put their relationship under extreme stress, throwing a spotlight on all their problems, as it does here. In fact, apartment-hunting is such a dramatic process, one that we all go through at one time or another, that it’s strange that there are so few films about it. You would think that every 10th movie would deal with it.
Intricate character creation, faultless acting
But it isn’t only the concept that’s interesting here. Real Estate: A Love Story works well because the characters are so carefully drawn and flawlessly acted that they will remind you of people you know, or yourself, or both. At times, it had almost a documentary feel to it, yet at the screening I attended, Levin confirmed to me that it was scripted from start to finish.
Both Tamara and Adam are difficult and have their quirks, as well as charms, and you can see the classic dynamic between them. Tamara, a graphic designer born in Russia and estranged from her bohemian, globe-trotting mother, who is living in Paris with one boyfriend or another, is marginally more practical and down-to-earth than Adam.
She wants their baby to grow up with a real feeling of home, which she obviously didn’t have herself. But she is drawn to the sexy Adam, the kind of guy who knows everyone on their street, even the beggar he borrows money from to buy the cigarettes he has promised Tamara he has stopped smoking. He works as a deliveryman and has abandoned a once-promising career as a musician. Both want this baby and are terrified of the responsibility that comes with having children.
The movie’s opening frames show a wrecking ball destroying houses on a Tel Aviv street. It’s Tamara who just can’t ignore it anymore. She insists they must see an apartment that day in unfashionable Haifa, a place that sounds ideal, but it is being offered by a disorganized woman, prone to disasters, who keeps putting them off.
During the day, they see a half-dozen apartments, and that’s another weird part of the house-hunting process: constantly being thrown into uncomfortable, sometimes intrusive conversations with strangers, and getting a glimpse into other people’s lives.
Malz again nails this element of the movie, showing different aspects of Haifa and Israeli life through the apartments the couple view and the people renting them: elderly Ashkenazim; a slightly younger Mizrahi couple; an Arab who works in hi-tech; a woman who is an artist and a healer and whose surly teen daughter tells them not to move to Haifa; a Russian couple who live in a funky apartment that couldn’t be less practical for a couple with a baby; and the family who live in the apartment that Adam declares is the essence of all that’s wrong with the world, a lovely place in a soulless high-rise that is surprisingly affordable.
But as they look, they keep thinking that if they can see that original apartment with the elusive owner, all their problems will be solved. It’s their holy grail.
As they go through this journey, they need to work out every aspect of their relationship, and their relationships with their families also come into play. Adam’s mother (Sarit Vino-Elad), who lives in Haifa, runs a very unglamorous business and would like to give him a job, but it’s an offer he rejects.
Though she has a temper, like her son, she is a confidant for both members of the troubled couple. Tamara eventually reaches out to her own mother, as well. There’s also a scene where Tamara gets a chance to see what Adam could make of his life as a musician if he were less insecure.
The three lead actors give vivid, intense performances – so much so that it seems as if they are playing themselves. This is Rosovsky’s feature-film debut and she gives an assured performance, while Levin is playful and soulful, the kind of guy women can’t help falling in love with even if they can see he’s not ready for responsibility.
Vino-Elad, who is only in a few scenes, gives a sublime performance. She’s down-to-earth and nurturing, but also self-absorbed and shares way too much with her son. Other actors include Ala Dakka, Nitza Shaul, Oleg Levin, Daniel Sabag, and Lir Katz.
If this were any other year, this movie would be playing in festivals around the world, and not only the Jewish and Israeli ones. It passed the most important test for me: I’m still thinking about it over a month after I saw it and noticing new aspects that are interesting, or that make me think about my own life.
It’s rare that a movie keeps living in your head, in a good way, long after you’ve left the theater. Real Estate: A Love Story is one of them.
‘Real Estate: A Love Story’ opens today in theaters throughout the country.
