The Israeli film Gett: The Trial of Viviane Amsalem, is what a Kafka-esque movie would be if Kafka were a feminist. It is a surreal, maddening, even funny story, which—like the recent Iranian film A Separation—uses a personal tragedy to call attention to a larger travesty, a particular kind of injustice that occurs in the world every day.

The set up is simple. A long-married Israeli woman and mother of four, Viviane Amsalem (the terrific Ronit Elkabetz), wants her freedom in the form of a gett, a Jewish divorce. Her pious and, as we learn, passive-aggressive husband, Elisha (Simon Ekbarian), refuses. According to the laws of the land, the couple must appear before a beit din (rabbinic court) and lay their arguments out before a panel of three Orthodox rabbis. If those judges are not convinced that the wife has grounds to terminate the marriage, the husband’s refusal stands. The wife remains trapped.

For all intents and purposes, she and Elisha are no longer a couple; they do not speak, let alone co-habit. Viviane has been living in an outbuilding on her sister’s property for the past three years. But the judges demand to know more. If Elisha does not beat her, if he does not withhold money or sex, if he is not an adulterer, then he is not a bad husband; and if he is not a bad husband, why should she want to leave?

In vain do Viviane and her lawyer, Carmel (played with power and desperation by Menashe Noy), try to explain that the man and the woman in question are badly matched for each other. She has regretted their semi-arranged marriage, which began when was 15, from its first days; ever since, she and Elisha have made each other miserable. The judges shrug as though to say, Nu? They send Viviane “home”—back to her husband’s house—to try to work it out. When that fails, they tell the plaintiff and the defendant to call witnesses.

Since the entire film takes place over five years (!) in a bleak cell-like courtroom and its adjoining waiting areas, the relatives and neighbors summoned to testify liven up the proceedings that otherwise remain as claustrophobic and dystopian as Terry Gilliam’s bureaucratic fantasy Brazil. They inject some much needed energy and even levity. They also help give a fuller picture of contemporary Israeli society, how insular it can be, how gossipy and constrained, even for those who try to live a modest yet fundamentally secular life. As Viviane’s sister says bitterly at one point, “Life for a divorced woman here is shit.”

The judges seem shocked, but more by the language than the sentiment. They must know that, as grim as the process is for Viviane to gain her freedom, her future is even grimmer: any victory is bound to be pyrrhic. Unless—like the wife in A Separation—she tries to take her children and leave, she will continue to be bound by the laws of a theocracy that values her husband’s honor over her happiness.

Image: Ronit Elkabetz as Viviane in ‘Gett.’ (Courtesy of Music Box Films)

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Some good news: Gital Dodelson is finally officially divorced, according to civil law and an Orthodox rabbinic court. The 25-year-old woman—who has been fighting to obtain a get from her husband, Avrohom Meir Weiss, for three years—announced the news on Wednesday via her publicist, Shira Dicker.

Dodelson’s story first came to our attention via this impassioned piece in the New York Post in November 2013, in which she detailed Weiss’ controlling behavior and emotional abuse:

On my last mission to ask for a get, a month ago, Avrohom said, “I can’t give you a get — how else would I control you?” I think that’s the key to it all. He insists the marriage isn’t over until he says it’s over.

We’ve tried everything — the informal route, negotiations. I’ve asked him myself, my parents have asked his, our camp tries to reason with his camp, but, counting down from the time when he sued for custody in March 2010 and I first asked him for a get, we’ve been shut down for 3¹/₂ years. One proposal his side put forward in January was for me to agree to override the court decision on custody of Aryeh and hand over a payment of $350,000. There’s no way I can afford that.

She also appeared on This American Life a few weeks ago in Mark Oppenheimer’s excellent segment on agunot (the Hebrew term for women whose husbands refuse to grant them a divorce—literally, “chained women”). According to Dodelson, Weiss was constantly changing his demands for the condition of the get. At one point he insisted that she agree to tell their four-year-old son (when he was older) that the failure of the marriage was her fault. Weiss’ family refused to comment on the case to Oppenheimer; his lawyer refuted Dodelson’s claims.

It’s a happy ending (or at least a bittersweet one) for Dodelson—but not so for scores of Jewish women all over the world stuck in marital limbo. Fortunately, there are advocacy groups working hard to support them and bring about change. (Over at Tablet, Batya Ungar-Sargon has a fantastic profile of Susan Weiss, the American-born lawyer pushing Israel’s rabbinate to change the way it handles divorce proceedings. Also related: this piece about a real-life ‘Get Detective’ who specializes in tracking down recalcitrant Jewish husbands who have abandoned their wives. Dark but compelling reading.)

Dodelson’s mother, Saki Dodelson, has vowed to start an organization to help other agunot. Says Dicker, “The family isn’t just skipping into the sunset. There’s a real sense of responsibility here.”

Photo credit: Shutterstock.

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• In Boca Raton, turning to social media as a way of publicly pressuring husbands who refuse to grant their wives a get.

• Woody Allen and Lindsay Lohan spotted having dinner together, possibly discussing casting roles in upcoming films.

• Jazzrael, a 10-day jazz and world music festival in New York, is underway.

• In NYC tonight? Vox Tablet host Sara Ivry will be moderating a panel on the changing role of music in new original theater at the JCC in Manhattan.

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