Opinion ArticleOpinion Article on Unorthodoxon Unorthodox - P. 1

Opinion Article

UNORTHODOX

As embracing as a blanket on a rainy march night, the story of Esther Shapiro, an unorthodox woman, will certainly guarantee you good surprises.

With a little more than 4 hours of duration, this Netflix miniseries brings us a breathtaking story. Together with a plot based on Deborah Feldman’s autobiography, it brings the story of a young girl born and raised in the Jewish community of Williamsburg, New York.

We join Esty right at the beginning of her journey for freedom, both psychological and physical, and we see a girl forced to become that which she didn’t want to. We follow the development of her search for her dream, which implies turning her back to her community ’s cultural legacy and all things which are familiar, to face the dreaded but free, unknown.

From New York to Berlin, the destiny of Esty ’s escape opens an interesting parallel, because it shows an ultra-orthodox Jewish girl, who chooses Germany to be the background of self-discovery. All that together with the confrontation between religion, past, and present, boils down to scenes of courage which end up immersing you in the plot completely.

An example of the incredible game of conscience and personal discovery is the emblematic Lake Wannsee’s scene, where 78 years before Esty ’s passing, was the set of the Nazi conference that planned the Jewish “final solution” – and is where now, Esty takes an important step towards her freedom – what a scene!

But the parallels between fiction and real life do not stop there, and make the series even more interesting, because for us, spectators, who weren’t raised in such a conservative place, a lot of the costumes, dialogues, and ways of acting are completely out of reality, feljglkjerkglj

SOURCE: IMDB.COM

making the plot awaken in us a feeling of strangeness towards that way of living.

Watching Unorthodox opens our eyes to the extreme cultural differences and to the perception of society, as a whole, its complexities and singularities, and watching a story such as Esty ’s, and knowing that the plot has a real story ’s background, is something interesting.

The way that the story shows Jewish customs, going beyond the haircuts and prayer moment’s, usually shown in the movies, allows us to know more of the Jewish culture, and put us in the paradox of cheering for Esty ’s freedom, and at the same time, understanding the wishes of her family for her return – another master trick by Maria Schrader, the director, winner of the 2020 Emmy ’s for best direction of miniseries.