(Yiddish Title: Yidl Mitn Fidl) Now Available on DVD. If you could choose one Yiddish video with which to be (kholile) stranded on a desert island, this is the one we'd recommend. Molly Picon plays a young woman who poses as a man in order to join a band of musicians, klezmorim in fact, travelling the Polish countryside. She falls in love with one of her colleagues with delightfully humorous results. Filled with music and charm, Molly, in her greatest role, amuses and entertains. Also with Simche Fostel, Max Bozyk, and Leon Liebgold. Made in Poland in 1936 and directed by Joseph Green and Jan Nowina-Przybylsi, this film is the most commercially successful musical in the history of Yiddish cinema, and was one of the three top-grossing Polish films of 1936. The score is by the great Avrom Ellstein, and the lyrics are by the great and beloved Yiddish poet Itsik Manger. The film introduced some of Molly Picon's most famous songs, including Yidl Mitn Fidl and Oy Mame Bin Ikh Farlibt Besides the sheer fun and entertainment, the film shows much that is of historic and cultural interest: e.g., scenes from the prewar central market of Kazimierz, a Jewish suburb of Cracow, Poland; and a wonderfully filmed Jewish wedding, complete with klezmorim, badkhn, weeping bride, the "Bobe Tants", etc.! "Miss Picon puts so much infectious gayety...that the result is genuine entertainment." --New York Times Published on video by Ergo, Inc. 92 minutes, released in 1936 Black & white film, in Yiddish with new English subtitles. Note: The title means "Yidl with his fiddle", where Yidl is both a boy's name and a generic nickname meaning "little Jew". The film with a dubbed English soundtrack was also released in the US as "Castles in the Sky". Title also sometimes transliterated as "Yiddle Mitn Fiddle". Links: 1937: Yiddle Mitn Fiddle, clips and film info in a section of the Molly Picon Exhibit at the Jewish Women's Archive; Internet Movie Database Info, q.v. for Molly Picon, et al.; Pictures of poet/songwriter Itsik Manger with Yiddish (transliterated) text from Andrey Bredstein Available on video in VHS NTSC only (for North American and Japanese video players) Now available on DVD! (For North American DVD players only.) The DVD has 'extras' like audio commentary by Joseph Green and some of the actors from the film; an introduction by Yiddish film historian Dr. Eric Goldman; a photo gallery; filmography and more. Please select Video or DVD. |