Every month, our partner Salzgeber's Gay Film Night presents a new gay film of the finest quality in numerous cities. The first film in 2011 is "The Crazy Love Life of Simon Eskenazy", a Jewish gay comedy from Paris. Fabulous!
The crazy love life of Simon Eskenazy" is actually a sequel: director and screenwriter Jean-Jacques Zilbermann already had Simon appear in 1998 in "Männer sind auch nur Frauen". In this film, Simon married and impregnated the strictly religious Rosalie - more or less by mistake - only to finally understand shortly afterwards that he is only interested in men sexually. In revenge, Rosalie denied him contact with their child and left France, but Simon was still happy.
A Jewish-gay comedy with clarinet, a great success with critics and audiences in its country of origin, France, celebrated at festivals around the world - when would there be another one like it?
Twelve years later, the time has come: Simon is back. The circumstances are different now, but no less complicated: Rosalie invites Simon to her second wedding in New York. There he cautiously tries to get closer to his son, who is anything but enthusiastic.
When Simon arrives back in Paris after the wedding, his mother Bella has broken her hip and wants to recover in Simon's flat, which immediately leads to the Auschwitz Committee gathering in his living room. What follows is an intimate campaign by Bella against the nurse hired by her son and hated by her. All of this disrupts Simon's love life beyond all measure, as he was actually busy convincing the shy philosophy student Rafael to leave his wife for him.
It doesn't come to that, because one morning Simon realises how boring his life would be with Rafael. This is mainly due to Naim, the most beautiful tranny in town, next to whom our hero wakes up on 14 July. With a gentle tug, Naim takes the reins of Simon's life out of his hands and provides some of the most beautiful dialogue and gender confusion of modern times in the next hour of the film. For example, Naim becomes Bella's new nurse and first fixes the old lady's hair and then her life. At the same time, Rosalie and her family - including Simon's son - suddenly turn up in Paris. In the end, everyone involved is modernly happy and the audience is glad to have been there.
Dani Levy's "Everything on Sugar" from 2004 is almost modest in comparison to "The Crazy Love Life of Simon Eskenazy" when it comes to finding material for comedy from the cultural clash of "Jewish tradition versus modernity". Jaques Zilbermann's new prank shows in a marvellous way how a director can tackle many hot potatoes in order to warm the hearts of the audience with comedy.
The crazy love life of Simon Eskenazy, France 2009, OmU
The film will be shown on Monday 17 and Friday 21 January on Gay Film Night in many cinemas throughout Germany. Exact dates and further information: http://gay-filmnight.com
