'God Is the Director'

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In the film, it appeared that you experienced some of this sense of the sacred among gentiles, during moments of political activism, for example, peace marches.

Literally, that was my first step outside the world of yeshiva, and the world that I had grown up in. This was in the '60s. And all these young people were fighting for tikkun olam, to make the world a better place. There were fighting against injustices in the South, in Southeast Asia, for civil rights. All the causes that motivated the young people of that age. It was alien to me, because I never even been involved in these issues. I could see that what was driving these people was a real, sincere desire to make the world a better place. And that seemed to me clearly a spiritual and holy motivation. So that was the beginning, I guess, of my continuous encounters with decency among people whom I had been told that decency couldn't be found amongst.

And I guess as I just kept encountering more and more people whom I wouldn't have met in that little world, I gradually kept on revising my thinking. While my children were growing up, I really started questioning many of the certainties that I had always taken for granted. And I think I mentioned in the film, that I really felt that I don't know all the answers to these questions.

Meanwhile, I sort of abdicated to some extent. I didn't share with them, just like my parents had not shared with me fully, all of their experiences during the war, I didn't [share my doubts about traditional Jewish ideas toward gentiles] when my kids were 7, 8, 9, 10, 12, I was living the life of an observant Jew, I observed the shabbas, kosher, I studied the Talmud with them, and all that.

So you reinforced certainties with your children rather than sharing doubts?

Well, I didn't share doubts, but on the other hand, I allowed their spiritual education to be taken care of by the schools that I sent them to.

Did they attend yeshiva?

Yes, very similar to the ones I had gone to. I tried to have my father have an influence on them, because my father to me was always the example, the role model of what a pious Jew should be. And my wife was also very influential. I sort of enjoyed the fun parts of the ritual with them. I enjoyed the holidays, I enjoyed telling the stories, I enjoyed even studying the Talmud was an opportunity for us to interact, but I never was really, really dogmatic about any of this.

But the only time I'll really intervene was when my kids would come home from school with some derogatory notions about the other, where I felt that their minds were being poisoned with demeaning attitudes towards outsiders. Because I had already gone past that, so I would try to disabuse them of such notions.

But "Hiding and Seeking" is really about what happens when your sons go much further in that direction on their own, and away from your perspective.

I went to Brooklyn College, but by the time my kids graduated high school, it was no longer acceptable in the ultra-Orthodox world to even consider going to college. The world had sort of constricted even further. But in my days it was okay after you graduated high school to continue your Talmudic studies in the morning and afternoon, and go to Brooklyn College in the evening. So you'd sort of split your day between secular and religious studies.

When my kids graduated high school, that was no longer an acceptable option. So they both went to Israel and left my home, and spent 14, 15 years and got married and started having their families, and really, really immersed themselves in that [ultra-Orthodox] world.

They didn't go to a secular college?

Not at all.

They're still part of the Haredi--ultra-Orthodox--community in Israel?

Yes, very much.

And that was one of the motivations for your making this film?

Despite my disagreements with the Hasidic and Haredi worlds, I still have great admiration for their tenacity, for their ability to rebuild after God had seemingly abandoned them. They persisted in their relationship and rebuilt these communities and schools. That was the subject of our previous film, "A Life Apart." And in that film, it does have some critical voices. There's an angry black man who's talking about how the Hasidim are raising their kids, and there's a Reform woman rabbi who takes on the Hasidim.

I gave critics of Hasidism an opportunity to come to the plate and give it their best shot, but on the whole, the film was a pretty warm portrayal of these people who everybody had counted out, and said there's no way they're going to rebuild after the Holocaust, and especially in America, and they went ahead and did it. So on the one hand I was critical, but I cut them a considerable amount of slack. But after 9/11, I realized I couldn't cut them the kind of slack I had.

So 9/11 was a major turning point?

This was clearly a post-9/11 film. It was a response to what I really felt. I felt I could understand Islamic fundamentalist terrorists. I could understand this concept of blinding yourself and losing yourself in this religion that you don't see your connectedness to the rest of humanity. I knew it. I had never been in one, but I sort of felt I could understand where they're coming from. And I realized that much of what drives them is very parallel to some of the less-attractive elements of the Haredi world.

Why this isn't a Jewish film
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