Between the layers of human existence and the supernatural, between matter and spirit, between the inhabitants of the soil and the children of humankind, there exists infinite space.

In the short animated film, the filmmaker tells the story of three characters who go to pray at the gravesites of saints in the Safed cemetery to receive blessings for livelihood, marriage and physical healing. The souls that dwell in the depths of the Earth hear their pleas, and are resurrected anew within the living body of each of the characters, which provides them with a weightlessness with which they can explore the world for one night.

Reisfeld adds a new mythological date to the Jewish calendar, the First of the month of Tammuz, which corresponds with the popular Jewish practice of praying at holy gravesites and engaging in days of celebration on the anniversary of the death of a great man. Such days are also commemorated with prayer, a custom that began among Babylonian Jewry and over the years has become a mass phenomenon.

The custom of prayer and prostration is a way for the faithful to connect to righteous people who have passed away. Their hope is to be relieved of their troubles and distress through this intermediary thread between them and God: “The righteous are more righteous in their death than in their life” (Chulin 7:2)

The tension between concerns in Jewish law about the impurity of the dead and the worship of saints, and the desire for physical and sensual contact with the graves of the righteous in order to gain spiritual purity, embodies an inherent ambivalence that exists in this tradition. In the film, the characters wake up the next morning and return to their usual reality. Whether they have experienced being possessed, *soul transmigration, dreams or visions, the revelatory experience is momentary and fleeting.

*”Ivor Neshamah” is a concept from the world of Jewish Mysticism and the literature of the Holy Ari, which describes the positive effect of a righteous soul entering one’s body, as opposed to a bewitchment, which is a negative effect and must be eliminated through an external intervention