JIFF: Enemies, A Love Story (1989)

The Story

A ghostwriter finds himself romantically involved with his current wife, a married woman and his long-lost wife! Scars from the Holocaust warp their behaviour as they try desperately, with love and passion, to find meaning in their post-war American lives.

October 29. 2pm

Classic Cinemas, Elsternwick

Gary Abrahams, award-winning theatre?maker and Singer aficionado, will be in conversation with co-director of the Retrospective, Anna Epstein, to explore why Singer’s work has been so relevant to our time and so superbly adaptable to film.

“This worldly, sensuous, wholly remarkable film.” - Washington Post

At a peaceful lake in the Catskills, a beautiful woman marvels: ''Where are the Nazis? What kind of world is this without Nazis?'' Relentlessly haunted by their survivor pasts, Singer’s tortured protagonists try to find meaning in their post-war American present. Herman (Ron Silver) is the handsome centre of a tangled web of emotions and women, including his volatile firebrand of a mistress, (Lena Olin), and his pre-war wife, (a majestic Anjelica Huston). With dark humour and poignant intensity, each vividly drawn character has to navigate the conflicting paths taken by their love and their duty. Weighed down by the scars of their sorrow, only some can partake in the possibilities of new life.

Rating

M

Duration

119 min

Director

Paul Mazursky