Goldberg & Eisenberg
Slamdance Film Festival
Director: Oren Carmi

A single, typical “liberal” computer programmer in Tel-Aviv, Goldberg (Yitzhak Laor) invests a lot of time meeting women to date online and walking his dog as an extension of his romantic pursuits. Unfortunately for him, he encounters Eisenberg (Yahav Gal), who attempts to make (read: tries to force) Goldberg to be his friend. Eisenberg demands money and blow jobs from Goldberg and gets under his skin to the point where the latter calls on the police, but to no avail, as Eisenberg increasingly pervades his life and nightmares. When Goldberg has one successful date with a beautiful woman (Roni Dotan)—who also has a dog—Eisenberg ups his game by harassing her, too. Gal executes the part of a malicious villain par excellence, who manipulates the riled-up Goldberg more and more by using and abusing the pet dogs in the movie. This psychological drama toes the line between being viscerally unsettling and situationally comedic. Director Oren Carmi has crafted a film whose tension becomes eclipsed by cringe-worthy surprises as the movie bulldozes onward—the ending I suspected sizzled away to an ironic underline of Eisenberg’s “tragic character” (as put by Carmi after the screening). This film is fucked up in the best of ways.

Screenings:

Date: 1.21, 1:45 PM Venue: Treasure Mountain Inn, Main Screening Room