The only antidote? Yentl and The Chosen on VHS.

December 11, 2020 7:49 PM

A great Hanukkah movie would be a miracle: Will Feinstein of The A.V. Club asks "What does it look like when Hanukkah has the rare chance to take center stage in holiday films? And why don’t we see more Hanukkah movies?"

BONUS: Emma Green in The Atlantic explains how this "minor holiday" became an American tradition.

posted by dannyboybell (47 comments total)

The title is a quote from the article about a plot point in The Hebrew Hammer, just so that's clear.
posted by dannyboybell at 7:55 PM on December 11, 2020 [3 favorites]

Twenty-two years ago, Slate covered the evolution of Hanukkah.
posted by MrGuilt at 8:22 PM on December 11, 2020 [1 favorite]

The holiday season is upon us. Not the “Christmas season” but the “holiday season”—a euphemism for “Christmas with Hanukkah (and, perhaps, Kwanzaa) thrown in.”

I always assumed “The Holidays” included New Year’s Eve/Day, too. I know it does when *I* wish people “Happy Holidays.” (I also used to think it included Thanksgiving, but I’ve recently learned that I’m in the minority on that one.)
posted by The Underpants Monster at 8:38 PM on December 11, 2020 [16 favorites]

I extend it a week beyond New Years to Bowiemas and Bowienalia.
posted by hippybear at 8:45 PM on December 11, 2020 [5 favorites]

I extend it a week beyond New Years to Bowiemas and Bowienalia.

Also Three Kens Day.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 8:50 PM on December 11, 2020 [4 favorites]

I have long considered this the part of the year when various and sundry cultural celebrations of some sort, most of a religious nature, occur around the December solstice. But I could be mistaken...
posted by jim in austin at 8:55 PM on December 11, 2020 [10 favorites]

I've always assumed 'Happy Holidays' included whatever one chooses to celebrate during December, including New Year's Eve/Day. If I've said it before Thanksgiving, then it included Thanksgiving too. Expand the holiday envelope, is what I'm saying.
posted by mollweide at 8:58 PM on December 11, 2020 [7 favorites]

If you click on the Google home page display of Christmas lights, it claims the 4 holidays in the Holiday Season are Christmas, Chanukah, Kwanzaa, and Boxing Day. The last one is not about beating people up, apparently.
posted by Harvey Kilobit at 9:13 PM on December 11, 2020 [1 favorite]

The last one is not about beating people up, apparently.

It commemorates the birthday of the robot from Logan’s Run.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 9:32 PM on December 11, 2020 [5 favorites]

I don't know if anyone would have the patience for a Hanukkah movie. I mean, wouldn't it be 8 times longer than a Christmas movie?
posted by sexyrobot at 9:53 PM on December 11, 2020 [15 favorites]

Actually, if you could design the right kind of Hanukkah movie that was actually an 8 episode series meant to be watched across successive nights, that might be the best thing of all.

Like, I don't know what the plot might be or how it might unfold, and maybe it's not a rom-com plot but something else more like an even more Jewish thirtysomething but it's all strongly drawn and relatable and refreshing and worthy of attention perhaps even outside the Jewish community.

I could see this becoming reality, but it would take the right writing team / production team / promotion team to make it really work.
posted by hippybear at 9:59 PM on December 11, 2020 [16 favorites]

Haha...right after I said that I was like...y'know what.. Ha. I was thinking more like 1/2 hour episodes for kids...maybe some kind of adventure with cliff-hangers to keep you tuned in.
And now I realize that Stranger Things is the perfect Hannukah movie in the same way Die Hard is the perfect Christmas movie. It's even 8 episodes. (How many days was Will stuck in Castle Byers?)
posted by sexyrobot at 10:11 PM on December 11, 2020 [1 favorite]

I've always said that New Year's Day counts in "Happy Holidays."

Also, ever notice that it seems like most religious are having some giant celebration right around the solstice because otherwise everyone would be super depressed at the dying of the light?
posted by jenfullmoon at 10:13 PM on December 11, 2020 [6 favorites]

Wait I haven't watched Stranger Things since first run, so how is it Jewish?
posted by hippybear at 10:13 PM on December 11, 2020 [1 favorite]

Well, Die Hard isn't reeeeally a Chrismas movie either...it's just set then. I dunno...something about Will staying alive in the upside down is kind of like the oil burning for 8 days in the temple. Thematic more than literal.
posted by sexyrobot at 10:23 PM on December 11, 2020 [3 favorites]

Die Hard isn't reeeeally a Chrismas movie either.

Is too! Definitely a Christmas movie. Sort of Miracle on 34th Street with an action star.
posted by CCBC at 10:39 PM on December 11, 2020 [2 favorites]

I've been spending my adult life trying and failing to explain to people that Hanukkah isn't Jewish Christmas. We don't have a Christmas. No dice. It's like telling a fish that we can just stand up and leave the pond whenever we feel like it.

Alas, the NSA itself (FB link) doesn't seem to understand the distinction. Like our holiday can literally only exist in contrast to Christmas.
posted by 1adam12 at 10:48 PM on December 11, 2020 [16 favorites]

It’s much easier to make a Christmas movie than to attempt to distill Hanukkah into something that still captures what we expect from holiday films.

And it's easier to write or find a mainstream home for thinkpieces about the dearth of Hanukkah movies and still use "holiday" to mean Christmas throughout them than it is to write anything equivalent about the dearth of, say, Passover movies.
posted by northernish at 11:35 PM on December 11, 2020 [1 favorite]

I have read some Stranger Things fanfic where the main kid, Mike Wheeler, and the rest of his family (so his badass older sister, sleepy dad, and conflicted mom) are Jewish. But I just can’t buy it for the actual show, though if they really wanted to make a very special Hanukkah season I would be there for it. There is that whole hidden minority thing the characters have where they look like everyone else in town but have endured vastly more trauma and yep, that sure feels Jewish to me.

I do really like how Christmas stuff has a long tradition of having spooky ghost stories and I wish Hanukkah had something with the same verve for subtext, but mostly we get “oh yeah, well we get to eat fried food!” For Passover we get exciting supernatural drama at least, and there have been a few successful shows and movies for it over time. But I don’t know. Hanukkah just hasn’t got a spooky backbone. Like, oil lasting longer than expecting? Not exactly spine tingling.
posted by Mizu at 12:50 AM on December 12, 2020

ALL RIGHT, YOU GUYS! I'm convinced! I WILL watch Die Hard for Christmas this year. Fuck! I just remembered I missed Krampus night. Fukken coronavirus screwing everything up.
posted by a humble nudibranch at 1:17 AM on December 12, 2020

I do really like how Christmas stuff has a long tradition of having spooky ghost stories and I wish Hanukkah had something with the same verve for subtext

There’s always the Chanukah Zombie.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 1:40 AM on December 12, 2020

my brother (who’s technically my half brother and i guess doesn’t really consider himself jewish) asked me if there was a hanukkah movie he could show his young children so they’d at least be aware of it and what it is and i couldn’t think of anything and ended up recommending the rugrats hanukkah special
posted by LeviQayin at 1:46 AM on December 12, 2020 [2 favorites]

I found that Atlantic article a little odd, in that discusses how Hannukah emerged as a festival to engage children but then contrasts it in several spots to Yom Kippur, without ever discussing Passover*. It leaves one with the impression that all traditional / liturgically-grounded Jewish holidays are somber, serious affairs for adults.

* Or Purim. Now that's a holiday I'd like to see elevated. Costumes and rattles for the kids, plenty of alcohol for the adults... eat your heart out, yuletide.
posted by Westringia F. at 3:56 AM on December 12, 2020 [16 favorites]

The last one is not about beating people up, apparently.


It's when piles of Amazon trash start to grow on the streets ...
posted by carter at 4:27 AM on December 12, 2020 [3 favorites]

There are so few Hanukkah films because the prominence of the holiday implied by the question exists only in a Christian perspective desperately pretending to be a secular one. Then again, this sort of clumsy inclusivity that misses the point and benefits only the would be "includers" is very on brand. As Westringia F. suggest above, Purim is very much the way to go, though Christopher Guest's For Your Consideration covers how likely that actually happening seems to me.

LeviQayin: This is actually fine, because it is very healthy watching something that reinforces the normalcy of Jewish holidays and being Jewish. There are also several messages from President Obama, while in office, addressing various Jewish holidays, if you want a healthy portion of salve for everyone.
posted by seraphine at 4:58 AM on December 12, 2020 [5 favorites]

In December, 1778, George Washington dined with Michael Hart, a Jewish merchant, during Hanukkah, but Jimmy Carter was the first president to recognize the holiday. In 2001, President Bush had the first party. Movie moments all.
posted by Ideefixe at 8:02 AM on December 12, 2020

In my Jewish family, we just celebrate something called Fake Christmas, usually around New Years Day.

Hannukah is a very minor holiday.
posted by subdee at 9:32 AM on December 12, 2020 [5 favorites]

We do this because everyone is off from work anyway, and it's fun to gather together and exchange gifts. But actually, only the children receive a gift from everyone (true on Hannukah as well in my family). The adults just do a gift pool like a white elephant, it's easier, cheaper and more entertaining.
posted by subdee at 9:38 AM on December 12, 2020

ALL RIGHT, YOU GUYS! I'm convinced! I WILL watch Die Hard for Christmas this year. Fuck! I just remembered I missed Krampus night. Fukken coronavirus screwing everything up.

Sir, this is an Arby's a synagogue.

There’s always the Chanukah Zombie.

I can't be the only one who felt like this should have been the Chanukah Golem?
posted by deadaluspark at 9:51 AM on December 12, 2020 [3 favorites]

Not a movie, but this is my favorite Chanukah audio story: The CBC's Barbara Budd reads Bone Button Borscht.
posted by Popular Ethics at 10:01 AM on December 12, 2020 [1 favorite]

I grew up with a lot of Jewish kids in the early '80s*. Hannukah back then was sort of a "let's do this stuff for the kids" event more than anything else— presents, stories, games, songs. I wonder if Hannukah has gotten more hyped and built up since those days long ago. I got to go to a Seder at a friend's house a couple times which was cool.

*First time I got drunk I was 12, taking coats and handing out white wine to elderly guests at some opera event at a Jewish Community Center. Turns out elderly folks attending a daytime opera performance don't drink much wine! Also, they had an Asteroids arcade game in the rec room that required NO QUARTERS!
posted by SoberHighland at 10:23 AM on December 12, 2020 [4 favorites]

Rabbi Berner weighs in.

When Chanukah Comes To Town

The Christians irritate us with their Christmasness - it seems like every year
And then the pagans reminded us they invented this - okay, we get it, it's clear
The Jewish children saw the others opening presents - it made them sad and blue
So their parents found a minor Jewish holiday - so they could open presents, too
posted by philip-random at 10:40 AM on December 12, 2020 [6 favorites]

In my Jewish family, we just celebrate something called Fake Christmas, usually around New Years Day.

Yeah, my Jewish friends celebrate Christmas, it's already there, and they already have the day off so what the heck.
posted by jenfullmoon at 12:59 PM on December 12, 2020

On the Holidays - I include Diwali in my intent for 'Happy Holidays' wishes. I've spent enough time working and growing friendships that one of my happiest annual parts is having my co-workers be represented and my holiday be in the back seat. I have no problems with the 'Holidays' starting sooner and sooner if it leads to more inclusion.

For our 'Very Covid Chanukah' this year we're doing a drive by challah delivery and they are throwing latkes at us.
posted by Nanukthedog at 1:14 PM on December 12, 2020 [4 favorites]

I always wanted to see a Jewish cover of that Gwen Stefani song.

I ain't no challah back girl.

I'll show myself out.
posted by deadaluspark at 1:23 PM on December 12, 2020 [1 favorite]

My spouse's family is Jewish, not religious, but emigrated from the USSR where most people transposed the more secular and Western Christmas traditions over to New Year's Eve due to official state secularization, and it then allowed participation regardless of religion (which you know, officially applied to everything else in the USSR, less so in actual fact for Jews and other minorities of course), so we just celebrate that.
And, at least before this year, we had dinner parties with various Jewish friends on different nights of Hanukkah, which also work(ed) well for us too.
For us antisocial introvert types, holidays like this are mainly an impetus for actually getting together with friends and family, which makes this particular season pretty tough.

I also once knew some people who's personal cause was removing all the profane commercialism from Christmas and boosting Halloween for that purpose instead, which was also an interesting take, and had great Halloween parties including amateur performance of It's The Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown as a holiday pageant.
posted by thefool at 1:24 PM on December 12, 2020 [2 favorites]

who's personal cause was removing all the profane commercialism from Christmas and boosting Halloween for that purpose instead,

I'm actually all-in on this idea. Halloween is a blast and since it is already celebrating sin in all its glory (lusty costumes, gluttonous amounts of candy, which inspires greed to hoard said candy, which inspires sloth after the sugar rush, and envy when someone else still has candy left, not to mention pride for your kickass costume) it seems like a perfect holiday for the gross sin of rampant consumerism.
posted by deadaluspark at 1:30 PM on December 12, 2020 [1 favorite]

I'm trying to decide between derails:
- US christians misunderstand Hanukkah in some ways similar to the US Cinco de Mayo phenomenon
- Purim parades at a scale to challenge Gay Pride
- there is an entirely valid secular and universal Xmas in the US - for which Jews have written most of the music btw - that has no relation to the goyishe Christmas, except that Christians combine both festivals under the same name.
- Seth Rogen's COVID Hanukkah miracle, where the weed lasted for eight nights
- Opting out of Xmas gets you the kind of disappointed aw! as when you say you don't do dogs. Calling Hanukkah 'Jewish Christmas' gets that same person to make the delighted oh! when you say you have cats instead; because they can relate to 'you have your own thing that's the same but different, that's cool'. It's not at all the same, but it moves the conversation along. (see also 'Ramadan is Muslim Lent, that's why she's not coming to lunch with us')
That's how Hanukkah becomes A Thing in a cooperative assimilationist culture, and you end up at an Ugly Hanukkah Sweater party.
- suburban houses decorated in blue and white lights, among their neighbors in red and green. With an eight foot menorah on the lawn; every night you get on a ladder and screw in another 40 watt lightbulb. And what that meant. Means?
- multi-religious-commune upbringing stories, of playing dreidel for candy canes and confused in-laws who thought they were invited to a big Easter dinner and ended up with a Maxwell House haggadah trying to follow along
posted by bartleby at 1:42 PM on December 12, 2020 [9 favorites]

Winter: the Festival of Lights. It gets fucking dark and cold in the northern hemisphere. So around solstice time it makes sense to fill the house with evergreens (because everything else is grey twigs or under the snow), make a big fire, turn all the lights on, and break out the booze and fancy snacks for a couple days. Before you go back to root vegetables and wet socks and slog through the rest of winter.

That's why Happy Holidays works in high diversity places: everyone's doing something in December, whether it's Festivus or Yule or Aardvark Day.
"Whatever your thing is on whichever day, have a good one this year!"
posted by bartleby at 2:07 PM on December 12, 2020 [5 favorites]

I found that Atlantic article a little odd, in that discusses how Hanukkah emerged as a festival to engage children but then contrasts it in several spots to Yom Kippur, without ever discussing Passover*. It leaves one with the impression that all traditional / liturgically-grounded Jewish holidays are sombre, serious affairs for adults.

* Or Purim. Now that's a holiday I'd like to see elevated. Costumes and rattles for the kids, plenty of alcohol for the adults... eat your heart out, yuletide.

Yeah, I mean it's obvious why you wouldn't build a film around Yom Kippur (or at least not one that is remotely similar to Christmas films) but Passover is also a family get together holiday with the attendant family tensions, preparation stresses, etc. would work very well. Lots of American Thanksgiving films have that exact same structure as well.

I think this is looking at things from the wrong direction though. The implied question seems to be, "If we build a whole sub-genre of films around the most important Christian holiday, why not the most important Jewish holiday?" and then we think we're being clever by pointing out that obviously Hanukkah is definitely not the most important Jewish holiday.

In fact we can go further than not the most important. Not only is it obviously less important historically and religiously than Passover and Yom Kippur, it's less important than Rosh Hashanah, less important than Shavuot, less important than Sukkot. Less important than Purim or Tisha B'av.

Hanukkah ranks with Tu BiShvat and who knows how many other minor holidays.

(I'm actually surprised that it was not more important in Askhenazi tradition considering how grim Northern Europe can get this time of year. Not so surprised that there wasn't a big winter festival pre-diaspora because Jerusalem is much further South)

But... let's backtrack a little. How did we get to this liturgically extremely unsound conclusion that Christmas was the most important Christian holiday? Why on earth would we think that when there is certainly no biblical basis for it. Easter is... well it's everything, isn't it? The whole spiritual foundation of the religion is founded on the basis of Easter and the events of Holy Week preceded by the 40 days of Lent. (BTW one of the linked articles talks about how the first Ashkenazi immigrants were quite nervous around the whole public Christmas mania - I imagine they would have been rightly terrified if there had been the same kind of build-up around Easter which has much more historical precedent as a pogrom trigger).

I think of Whitsunday as more important than Christmas spiritually.

Here's the thing though. Movies were not made about Christmas. It's the other way around. Those movies themselves created the modern American Christmas.
posted by atrazine at 2:14 PM on December 12, 2020 [9 favorites]

I didn't know of Purim until I started dating my wife, a Jew. The only reason I can think of that its not better known and possibly appropriated (imagine: Purim drink specials!) is that it seems to fall between Mardi Gras and Saint Patrick's day. I can only figure everyone's liver needs a break.
posted by MrGuilt at 6:14 PM on December 12, 2020

I mean it's obvious why you wouldn't build a film around Yom Kippur
*ahem*
The Jazz Singer?
posted by cheshyre at 8:33 PM on December 12, 2020 [2 favorites]

I remember learning about Purim from the All-of-a-Kind Family books. I read about Ella getting a part in the Purim play very soon after we got to the story of Esther in our family bible reading. I remember wishing we could have our own Purim play!
posted by The Underpants Monster at 8:47 PM on December 12, 2020 [1 favorite]

The only reason I can think of that its not better known and possibly appropriated (imagine: Purim drink specials!) is that it seems to fall between Mardi Gras and Saint Patrick's day.

Every now and then, Purim does fall on St Patrick's Day. SNL once had (what my memory tells me was) a really funny sketch about it, but every year I google and so far no one's posted video of it

I would love to have a great (or even a good) Chanukah movie to watch, if only to have a tiny moment of representation in the middle of all the Christmas media. In the meanwhile, I've never found anything that encapsulates my feelings this time of year as well as Lemony Snicket's The Latke That Couldn't Stop Screaming. It is fantastic.
posted by Mchelly at 10:05 AM on December 13, 2020

I also once knew some people who's personal cause was removing all the profane commercialism from Christmas

[Wincing Drake gif]

and boosting Halloween for that purpose instead,

[Smiling Drake gif]
posted by pykrete jungle at 10:20 AM on December 13, 2020

I am wondering now whether it is an accident of time, or geography, or culture, that:
a) I can probably 'win' your office's Holiday Cookie Exchange. My secret? Hamantaschen.
b) I am racking my brain for a memory of a Jewish gathering, from births to deaths to movie night at the JCC, at which a tray or big pink box of 'Italian Christmas Cookies' was not present. (or at least would be embraced with gusto)
posted by bartleby at 7:50 PM on December 16, 2020 [2 favorites]

Great, now I’m really jonesing for some good Hamantaschen.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 9:10 PM on December 16, 2020 [1 favorite]