Sunday, January 25, 2009

LIVEBLOGGING LOVING LEAH



Most people liveblog award show. Me, on the other hand, I'm liveblogging the last hour of CBS and Hallmark Films present Loving Leah.

- Lauren Ambrose, or "Leah," a hasidic runaway, is arguing with her secular, non-observant brother-in-law, or "husband" Jake (yes, this is all very confusing) and this is the epitome of preposterous cheese, yet I can't look away. I want more.

- Leah and Jake are in a kosher Chinese restaurant. It looks too fancy for a kosher restaurant and thus makes this portion of the movie unrealistic.

- Jake explains to his shiksa girlfriend that he couldn't reach Leah on the phone for the past 24 hours because it was shabbos. He then leaves Leah for a booty call while she returns to his apartment all alone where she will presumably make a challah or circumcise a child, or do something of a religious nature.
(She goes to bed. Unclimatic)

- The next morning, Jake helps Leah with her SAT prep. She is frustrated with studying so much so he suggests that she needs a break.
Next scene: they're at a pool. "I told you," she says, "I don't really know how to swim."
"I'll teach you," he says.
And the water then suddenly turns to blood.
Well, not really. But that would've been cool.

- "I'm in love with him," Leah finally reveals to the sassy black cleaning lady.
Ohnoyoudin't.

- Mama, or Curb Your Enthusiasm's Susie Esses, is coming to town and so Leah is making brisket. She has to make Mama believe that this marriage is real. And so a brisket is the only way.

- Mama: "Do you belong to a shul, Jake?"
Jake: "No, but I belong to a gym."
Zing!

- Leah and Jake must convince Mama that they are in fact married and so they share a room. [Jake inexplicably has Judaic needlework on his wall.] They sleep in the same bed but put a wall of pillows between them. Unfortunately, they are not the "Shalom" and "Mazel Tov" pillows Mama complimented earlier in the night (yes, that really happened).

- Leah takes off her sheytel for a fancy black tie affar. Shana is disappointed in Leah because, as she yells out, "why should she change for him?!!?" To be honest, Shana is not wrong. If she takes off the sheytel, the least he can do is use "shmooz" or "schlep" in conversation.

- Jake and Leah finally lock lips. And...commercial?!? Really?!?

- A year has passed since Jake's brother and Leah's ex-husband has passed away and Jake is now feeling the guilt of being married to his brother's wife. And so he runs off to be alone and deal with the pain. Thankfully, he's got a wise-cracking best friend with an available couch.
"I liked you better when you didn't date relatives."
High-five!

- Leah left Jake because, well, it got awkward, and so she returns to Brooklyn to her Mama because there's an oft-chance that she could get a cameo on Curb.

- Leah passed the SATs and so Jake drives up from Washington, D.C. to deliver the scores to her. She did really well. The end.

[Note: The original title of the movie was Unorthodox. I wonder what the intentions of this film were...]

3 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

I watched 20 minutes of this but could go no further. it was painful.

3:46 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

You are a brave person to watch that movie and blog it.

Susie Essman from Curb Your Enthusiasm? Who cast this crazy movie? Who can suspend disbelief to watch her play the mother? Crazy. How did you sit through this craziness!

At least it had fewer mistakes than most other Jewish movies...although calling the kids mashugas when they should have been called mashuganas might have been more of a grammatical mistake.

11:47 PM  
Blogger Arye said...

Someone had to suffer by watching this movie. Better me than you.

8:51 AM  

Post a Comment

<< Home