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Hester Street
Series: BFI Film Classics
Brief Description
Joan Micklin Silver’s groundbreaking debut feature film, Hester Street (1975), vividly portrays the immigrant experience through the eyes of Gitl (Carol Kane), a young, Orthodox Jewish woman who arrives in New York City from Eastern Europe at the end of the nineteenth century. Reunited with her...
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Hester Street
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See moreA study of Hester Street (1975), Joan Micklin Silver's landmark drama of Jewish immigrant life in turn of the century New York, in the BFI Film Classics series.
A study of Hester Street (1975), Joan Micklin Silver's landmark drama of Jewish immigrant life in turn of the century New York, in the BFI Film Classics series.
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Description
Joan Micklin Silver’s groundbreaking debut feature film, Hester Street (1975), vividly portrays the immigrant experience through the eyes of Gitl (Carol Kane), a young, Orthodox Jewish woman who arrives in New York City from Eastern Europe at the end of the nineteenth century. Reunited with her already-assimilated husband, Gitl finds they now have little in common and she is forced to adjust to a new way of life. Hester Street achieved international critical and commercial success, and Kane received a Best Actress nomination at the 1976 Academy Awards.
Marking the film’s 50th anniversary, Julia Wagner’s landmark book is the first to focus exclusively on Micklin Silver’s film. Wagner examines how, despite the sexism and prejudice that Micklin Silver faced, a low-budget, black-and-white, female-led, independent production with Yiddish dialogue became an unexpected box-office hit. Through close analysis, Wagner highlights the importance of Hester Street as a milestone in cinema and affirms Micklin Silver’s status as a unique voice in the history of American film-making.
Series: BFI Film Classics
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Book Details
INFORMATION
ISBN: 9781839028069
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing PLC
Format: Paperback / softback
Date Published: 16 October 2025
Country: United Kingdom
Imprint: BFI Publishing
Illustration: 60 bw illus
Audience: Tertiary education
DIMENSIONS
Spine width: 8.0mm
Width: 134.0mm
Height: 190.0mm
Weight: 180g
Pages: 112
About the Author
Julia Wagner is a writer and lecturer based in London, UK, specialising in Jewish film and culture, documentary and Italian cinema. She holds a PhD in Film Studies and has written widely for publications including Sight and Sound and the Jewish Chronicle. She curated the BFI/JW3 archival project Jewish Britain on Film.
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