By Donald H. Harrison
SAN DIEGO — Scaffolding, a Hebrew-language film with English subtitles, is a story of Asher (Asher Lax), a troubled 12th grade student, whose temper gets him in trouble with teachers, administrators, and other students alike. Asher has no respect for boundaries, nevertheless he has about him an innate sense of justice. His father Milo (Yaacov Cohen), an ex-con, is divorced from Asher’s mother, and most of the “jokes” he tells to his friends and associates are misogynistic stories about how liberating it is to get rid of a wife.
Milo’s company builds scaffolding for construction jobs, a company that he anticipates that Asher will inherit, both because he is his only son and because Asher does not do well enough in school to be a likely candidate for success in any other field. But, Milo is not the only father figure in Asher’s life; there is also Rami (Ami Smolartchik), who teaches literature at the school. Although Asher cannot restrain himself from talking back to Rami—or to anyone else that matter—there is an unspoken bond between the two. Like Asher, Rami also is broken—as evidenced first by his facial tick which he explains to his class is the way his body tries to release tension. But Rami’s troubles run much deeper than that.
One of the assignments that Rami gives to Asher is to write down the questions he would ask his father in quick succession if he had the opportunity. Rami does not blow off this assignment; he even turns it in without prompting. One of Asher’s behavior problems is an inability to deal with suspense; he needs to know how a story turns out, long before it is finished. He needs to know promptly how he scored on a test. Of course, he needs to know what Rami thought of the questions he had penned for his father.
Rami, however, never turns the paper back to Asher, prompting his student to once again go beyond acceptable boundaries.
We don’t learn about the questions Asher would like to have his father until the end of the movie – a situation that mimics a question on an oral test that Asher takes in an effort to earn his high school diploma.
Having made the rounds of several film festivals, Scaffolding opens in New York on Sept. 28; in Los Angeles Oct. 5, and in theaters elsewhere thereafter. The film, which was written and directed by Matan Yair, is expected to be released on DVD in December.
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Harrison is editor of San Diego Jewish World. He may be contacted via donald.harrison@sdjewishworld.com