INTERVIEW : ‘Quarrel’ Touches a Nerve : Director Eli Cohen Finds Drama in ‘Two Guys Talking’

It was an unlikely accolade. The Crystal Heart Award of the evangelical-supported Heartland Film Festival given to “The Quarrel,” the tale of two philosophically opposed Holocaust survivors--the ultra-Orthodox Hersh and the humanist Chaim--who, during a chance reunion after the war, debate God’s presence in a world of evil.

This insistently ethnic, two-character film (opening at the Laemmle Sunset 5 today) has touched a nerve in other quarters as well. Frequently compared with the 1981 “My Dinner With Andre,” it walked off with the first prize at the Santa Barbara Film Festival last April. Several weeks ago, the picture, starring Saul Rubinek and R.H. Thomson, was nominated for best director and best adapted screenplay at the Genie Awards--the Canadian equivalent of the Oscars.

“We worked hard to make it specific,” notes writer-producer David Brandes, 47. “But the issue--the role of faith in a world antagonistic to it--is, at bottom, a universal one. A black pastor stood up during a post-screening discussion to say that they too asked where God was when there were lynchings in the South. They too, he said, are undergoing a philosophical debate between the older, more spiritual blacks and younger ones who label them ‘Toms.’ ”

Director Eli Cohen views the tale, his first English-language film, as a microcosm of the political conflict brewing back home. “In Israel, this is the burning issue of our time: the argument between the religious right, which determines which party holds power, and the liberals who are further to the left,” he explains. “It’s much more volatile and emotional than the problem with the Palestinians.”

Brandes obtained the rights to Chaim Grade’s Yiddish short story “My Quarrel With Hersh Rasseyner” seven years ago. Though few of his colleagues believed “two guys talking” could make the transition to celluloid, the former Canadian TV news reporter and UCLA Film School graduate undertook a five-year battle to prove them wrong. He wrote a screenplay based on a play by his friend Rabbi Joseph Telushkin, staged readings on both coasts (including one at the home of director Arthur Hiller), and managed to raise $400,000 from private investors--three or four of whom took him up on an invitation to appear as extras in the film. The breakthrough came when Toronto-based Atlantis Films agreed to co-produce and to try to raise the balance of the $1.5-million budget. Lindsay Law of PBS’ “American Playhouse” also helped, adding another $200,000--and, more important, credibility--to the project.

Brandes chose the 51-year-old Cohen to direct after watching 15 minutes of his 1988 feature, “The Summer of Aviya,” which won the second prize at the Berlin International Film Festival. Not only filmmaking ability, but ideology came into play. “I chose Eli because I knew he was a cynic,” says Brandes, who calls himself a “somewhat observant Conservodox Jew . . . somewhere between Moses and Woody Allen.” “It would be the kiss of death if this movie turned into schmaltz and the characters into metaphors.”

“Chaim was my ‘favorite son,’ ” admits Cohen, a self-described agnostic less interested in the ideological aspects of the picture than in the emotional baggage between the two characters. “But to balance the film, I made him vain, self-centered, somewhat obnoxious--a man who doesn’t live the humanist life he preaches. Though I didn’t want to woo the audience by making Hersh more accessible, I hope they walk out understanding his monolithic views--the conviction that if you take one brick out of the building everything falls apart. David (Brandes) was all the time on guard, concerned that we weren’t doing justice to him. I wanted balance to keep the conflict alive.”

“The Quarrel,” Cohen maintains, is not your typical “Holocaust” film. “There are no concentration camps with wires or people in pajamas--images which cause people to put their defenses up,” he explains. “Because it’s two people . . . not millions . . . people can get closer to them. Like ‘The Pawnbroker,’ we deal with the aftermath of the tragedy--the sense of abandonment and the guilt--instead of showing the event itself.” Though independent production outfits such as the Samuel Goldwyn Co. expressed interest in distributing the film, none of them picked it up. Rather than accept an offer from one of the smaller concerns, Brandes opted to go it alone. Legal and marketing counsel and a movie trailer have been provided to his Apple & Honey Film Corp. on a pro bono basis or at cost. A bare-bones advertising campaign is in the works. After the theatrical release, home video and direct mail (pitching the movie for discussion groups and religious holidays) will be another part of the marketing strategy.

“The Quarrel” opened to respectable business at New York’s Film Forum on Nov. 4. Word of mouth (plus a plug by former mayor-turned-film-critic Ed Koch on “The Tonight Show”) caused box office to double during week two. Still, acknowledge the filmmakers, the movie is a tough sell: esoteric subject matter requiring an intellectual investment on the part of the audience.

“My friends advised me against starting my North American career with such a film,” Cohen recalls, “but I like risky situations. It was like taking two pawns on a chessboard and playing with them, exploring the possibilities. Still, I’d also like to make a film with 10,000 extras, 200 cars crashing into each other.

“Since I’ve always regarded American movies as the epitome of filmmaking, it would be unnatural not to have an urge to have a foothold here. When it comes to filmmaking at least, Israel has a justifiable sense of inferiority. We have excellent actors and directors, but low budgets and poor material conditions determine the artistic outcome. In this sense, I guess, I’m a Marxist.”

Cohen is currently peddling another English-language project to the studios: one dealing with an extramarital love affair between an ultra-religious Jewish woman and a more secular man.

“I’m telling the Americans it’s a cross between ‘My Fair Lady,’ ‘Witness’ and ‘Fatal Attraction,’ ” he says with a smile. “ ‘My Fair Lady,’ in that he teaches her about life. ‘Witness,’ in that he’s an outsider entering a closed, strict community. ‘Fatal Attraction,’ in that obsessiveness leads to destruction. Now, let’s be modest. . . . I’m not comparing it to those films. But, without sounding too critical of Hollywood, I’ve found you have to describe it in those terms.”