Yippee! A Journey to Jewish Joy (tbc)
- Run time: 1 hour 14 mins
- Genre: Documentary
- Release date: 1st January 2006
- Starring: Paul Mazursky
- Directed by: Paul Mazursky
Plot Synopsis
Paul Mazursky didn’t get where he is today by shirking a challenge. For his latest project the celebrated filmmaker abandons Beverly Hills to go (almost) down and out in Uman, a small Ukrainian town visited each year by 25,000 male Hassidic Jews on pilgrimage to the gravesite of Rabbi Nachman and his great grandfather the Baal Shem Tov, founder of the Hassidic movement.
Mazursky sets about interviewing Hassidic pilgrims from around the world and the bemused but friendly Ukrainian locals. Though not about to let them forget he's a ‘famous film director’, Mazursky seems admirably undaunted by the prospect of sharing a room with half a dozen grown men and just the one loo. He's a chaotic but jovial tour guide, and this low-key film, dubbed by Mel Brooks as ‘funny, fascinating and surprisingly touching’, suggests the secular can learn from the devout, in the process rediscovering their own sense of Jewish joy. Yippee!