Hester Street (film)

Hester Street tells the story of Jewish immigrants who come to the Lower East Side of New York City in 1896 from Eastern Europe, and who live on Hester Street in Manhattan. When Yankle first comes to the U.S., he quickly assimilates into American culture, and becomes Jake. He also begins to have an affair with Mamie, a dancer. His wife, Gitl, who arrives later with their son, Yossele, has difficulty assimilating. Tension arises in their marriage as Jake continually upbraids and abuses Gitl. Additionally, Jake continues to see Mamie, which Gitl later discovers through Mrs. Kavarsky, a neighbor. Jake and Gitl ultimately divorce, whereby Gitl takes all of Mamie's money and marries Bernstein, a faithful traditionalist. By the end of the film, she is sartorially and lingually assimilated — walking down the street with Bernstein and Yossele (now known as Joey), speaking English, and showing her hair. But she is now liberated from Jake, who in turn has married Mamie.

The film is noteworthy for its detailed reconstruction of Jewish immigrant life in New York at the turn of the century - much of the dialogue is delivered in Yiddish with English subtitles - and was part of the wave of films released in the late 1960s and through the 1970s which began explicitly to deal with the complexities of American Jewish identity. In addition, Carol Kane's lead character posed a still-provocative synthesis as she discovers her own self-assertion on behalf of her right to maintain a traditional identity in an aggressively modern setting.

• Steven Keats as Jake
• Carol Kane as Gitl
• Mel Howard as Bernstein
• Dorrie Kavanaugh as Mamie
• Doris Roberts as Mrs. Kavarsky
• Lauren Friedman as Fanny

Variety was positive, stating that Hester Street "deftly delves into Jewish emigration" and that Silver "displays a sure hand for her first pic".[3] Turned down by multiple Hollywood studios for being "too ethnic," Hester Street went on to earn $5 million at the box office against a budget of only $370,000.[4]

Hester Street was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actress - Carol Kane. In 2011, this film was deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" by the United States Library of Congress, and selected for the National Film Registry.[5] In making its selection, the Registry state that Hester Street was "a portrait of Eastern European Jewish life in America that historians have praised for its accuracy of detail and sensitivity to the challenges immigrants faced during their acculturation process".[5]

• Hester Street essay by Eric A. Goldman on the National Film Registry website
• Hester Street on Turner Classic Movies
• Hester Street at IMDb