Trailer

On the Road

TREMBLING ON THE ROAD

The 5th Anniversary Celebration of Trembling on the Road

DuBowski launched a 5th Anniversary Celebration of Trembling on the Road which historicizes, landmarks, archives, spotlights and shares how millions of people around the world have been impacted by this work.

This campaign unfolds in three phases. The kick-off coincides with the 10 days between Rosh Hashanah (The Jewish New Year) and Yom Kippur (The Day of Atonemen), where he is launching a creative and innovative international Web 2.0 and face-to-face campaign to organize 250 Trembling on the Road screening and discussion events in homes, workplaces, and houses of worship. The aim of the campaign is to catalyze people to reflect on the questions: Have you created a more open and welcoming home, synagogue, family, and community? - and to take an action step: Where can you make a transformative change?

The goal is to reach over 100,000 Jews and non-Jews.

Now years after the Sundance World Premiere, and over a decade into the project, Trembling Before G-d has gone way beyond what anyone ever dreamed or imagined and the work with the film to impact social change continues. (source: Trembling Before G-d website )

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WHAT FOLLOWS IS A BLOG FROM THE FILM’S WEBSITE DESCRIBING THE IMPACT OF AND REACTIONS TO TREMBLING BEFORE G-D .

December 5, 2007 8:29 AM 

Gay Muslim Outs Himself to Muslim Scholars at Conference

In an amazing act of courage, one of A Jihad for Love's friends in Toronto, Suhail, came out at a major gathering of Muslim scholars from Afghanistan to Yemen at the International Consultation on Islam and HIV/AIDS, organised by the charity, Islamic Relief Worldwide (IRW), in Johannesburg, South Africa, last week.

The previous day, several of them had denounced homosexuality as un-Islamic and evil.

Today, AbualSameed had something to tell them.

“As a gay Muslim, I feel unsafe, unloved and unrespected in this space,” he said.

“Were I to become HIV-positive, the first thing I would lose is my Muslim community. I couldn’t come to you guys for support.”

You could cut the tension the room with a knife.

AbualSameed continued: “I wish you did not refer to gays with the (Arabic) words ‘shaz’ and ‘luti’ – perverts and rapists – because we are not.”

Two men in keffiyas, the gingham headcloth worn by men in many Muslim countries, waved their arms to silence him but the chairman nodded for him to continue.

Spellbound, the audience listened as AbualSameed, a Jordanian living in Canada, did the unthinkable: outing himself.

The groundbreaking consultation brought together Muslim community leaders, academics, doctors, relief workers and HIV-positive activists to rethink the Islamic response to HIV and AIDS. One key issue was HIV prevention among hard-to-reach vulnerable groups like sex workers, street children, injecting drug users, and men who have sex with men.

Jaffer Inamdar, the HIV-positive founder and programme manager of the Positive Lives Foundation in Goa, India, told IRIN/PlusNews: “Lots of sex, drugs and gay activity take place during the high season from September to April in this popular tourist destination. Harsh, condemning language make them [gays] run away, hide and continue to spread HIV.”

Anti-gay laws

Homosexuality is forbidden and considered a crime in most Islamic countries. Six officially Islamic countries (Iran, Mauritania, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Yemen, and the 12 northern states of Nigeria) invoke sharia – Islamic religious law – and maintain the death penalty for consensual same-sex sex, according to human rights watchdog Amnesty International.

Other countries punish homosexuality with fines, jail or lashes, coupled with social stigma and blaming Western culture for introducing gay lifestyles.

Not surprisingly, AbualSameed was fearful.

“I saw their gaze, their body attitude, and my memory told me there could be a physical reaction,” he said.

But he had nothing to fear.

“Afterwards, veiled women, bearded men, the most religious types, came to me and apologised if they had said something offensive, if they had made me feel unloved or unsafe.”

Each friendly gesture signalled belonging.

“This is us: our culture is intimate, warm, based on relationships. When I outed to my family, they did not turn on me,” a relieved AbualSameed told IRIN/PlusNews.

The following morning, the ulama had a surprise.

Conference spokesperson and IRW head of policy Willem van Eekelen read their collective statement, saying that although Islam does not accept homosexuality, Islamic leaders would try to help create an environment in which gay people could approach social workers and find help against AIDS without feeling unsafe.

“This first time ever that a high-level religious forum has talked, acknowledged and accepted gays,” said AbualSameed.

“This will open the door to talks with the Muslim gay community and help other gay Muslims to come out in a safer space.”

To see theologians from Egyptian and Syrian universities, and imams – Muslim community leaders – from India, Sudan and Pakistan defy official Islamic homophobia is “definitively a first,” said sheikh Abul Kalam Azad, chairman of the Masjid (mosque) Council for Community Advancement, in Bangladesh.

“Homosexuality is a sin but we should not be cruel. They [gays] suffer a lot in the Muslim world.”

Inamdar welcomed the statement.

“There are many gays in my group [in Goa]. Islam says it is a sin and we have to follow Islamic rulings, but we are all human and deserve respect.”

An unlikely ally for gay rights turned out to be Sudanese sheikh Mohamed Hashim Alhakim, dressed in a white robe with gold trimmings and a white turban, and his wife, clad in a black hijab, with their baby just behind him.

Alkahim runs the S-Smart Training and Consultancy Centre in Khartoum, which also runs AIDS awareness programmes.

“I used to be very hard against homosexuals and sex workers,” he said. “But I learned to respect their humanity. I advise them to change, but if they are going to continue they must practice safe sex so they don't harm themselves and their partners.”

Evil ways

During the weeklong consultation, AbualSameed, who is coordinator of the Newcomer/Immigrant Youth Programme at the Sherbourne Health Centre in Toronto, had endured homophobic statements.

Just the day before, one scholar had ranked homosexuality with bestiality and adultery as evils to avoid.

“The harshness of the comments made me passionate; I had to do something for my own identity and dignity, and of other gay Muslims,” said AbualSameed.

His decision to speak out was nurtured in his conference working group, made up of Muslims from Iran, Kenya, South Africa and Tanzania.

South African psychologist Sabra Desai spoke about care and solidarity, and recalled the Prophet’s words: “‘If one part of my body hurts, my whole body hurts’,” she said. “I take this to mean that if one member of my community hurts, we all hurt.”

Then she squeezed AbualSameed’s hand under the table and passed him the microphone.

Slowly, he started: “As a Gay Muslim …”.

And with every word, the doors of tolerance opened wider. http://www.ukgaynews.org.uk/Archive/07/Dec/0302.htm

Read more of the Trembling Before G-d blog  

Tipping Point

Sandi Simcha DuBowski

DuBowski engaged rabbis, communal leaders, and tens of thousands of Jews: Orthodox, Conservative, Reform, unaffiliated; queer and straight, teenagers to grandparents in dialogues in movie theaters nationwide. He organized screenings in hundreds of synagogues across the country, at Hillels, JCCs, Jewish film festivals, and otherJewish organizations. DuBowski's own Conservative rabbi from Brooklyn, who he had known since birth and who had no contact with the issue of homosexuality, changed through this process and embraced GLBT inclusion. There were many like him across the country. Families who had disowned their GLBT children opened up lines of communication again. People came out for the first time. Persons who had been alienated from their Jewish communities reconnected.

DuBowski raised funding from a wide range of foundations to launch an Orthodox Outreach and Education Project. Supporters included The Steven Spielberg Righteous Persons Foundation, The Threshold Foundation, The Walter and Elise Haas Foundation, The Shefa Fund, The Paul Robeson Fund for Independent Media, The Creative Capital Foundation, The Nathan Cummings Foundation, and The Rita and Stanley Kaplan Foundation.

Over seventeen Orthodox synagogues in the U.S., Canada, and UK invited Trembling Before G-d to screen in the synagogues. Yeshiva Chovevei Torah, the open Orthodox seminary, an alternative to Yeshiva University, included Trembling Before G-d in their pastoral training.

In the U.S., DuBowski, Rabbi Greenberg, Orthodox therapist Naomi Mark, Dr. Jack Drescher, and Shlomo Ashkinazy, conducted the first-ever Orthodox Mental Health Conference on Homosexuality. Fifty Orthodox and Hasidic/ultra-Orthodox mental health professionals were flown from sixteen North American cities for the conference in NYC to be trained in how to work with gays and lesbians. Many of the participants held significant positions of leader ship in their fields — professors, directors of community-based mental health centers, psychologists and guidance counselors in yeshiva day-schools and university based counseling centers. For many of the participants, this was the first time that they had an opportunity to discuss therapeutic issues directly with an Orthodox gay person. They went back to their communities and created gay-affirmative therapy practices, schools and communities. As many took a great risk to attend, the conference and those who attended was kept secret.

In Israel, Rabbi Greenberg, Tanya Zion, and DuBowski launched the Israel Outreach Project. To prepare for the Israeli television broadcast of Trembling on Keshet/Channel Two, they trained 11 facilitators in Jerusalem who conducted private screenings and post-screening dialogues with over 2,000 principals, teachers, superintendents, rabbis, school counselors and youth workers throughout the nation and in the secular and Orthodox school system. The response dramatically exceeded their expectations and was truly a groundbreaking accomplishment in a system where silence has been the rule.

It was not only the Orthodox community that was powerfully affected through this work. At the 2002 Conservative Rabbinic Conference at the movement's 100th Anniversary, DuBowski began organizing efforts with a special screening of the film to target the movement's top leaders. In a 2002 Washington Post article titled "Rabbis in the Middle On Homosexual Issues Debate Ordination of Gays," Alan Cooperman wrote:

"Three hundred and fifty rabbis from the Conservative branch of Judaism are in Washington for a          convention this week, and a bunch of them have slipped off to the movie. Not the movies. The movie: Trembling Before G-d, a documentary about gay male and lesbian Orthodox Jews that has caused a furor in the Orthodox community in the United States but ultimately may have more impact on the much larger Conservative movement. The rabbinical praise for Trembling Before G-d is also noteworthy. "Poignant," says Rabbi Ismar Schorsch, chancellor of the Jewish Theological Seminary in New York. "Very touching," says Rabbi Kassel Abelson, chairman of the Conservative movement's Committee on Jewish Law and Standards. "Very powerful," says Rabbi Elliot N. Dorff, rector of the University of Judaism in Bel Air, Calif. They should know, because all three are major players in the long-running debate within the Conservative movement over whether to ordain gay men and lesbians as rabbis and perform commitment ceremonies for gay couples."

Last winter, after years of intense discussion and debate, the Conservative Movement made a bold and historic policy change: legalizing the ordination of gay and lesbian rabbis and the ability to perform same-sex unions.

The DVD

A major accomplishment was completing a Deluxe 2-Disc Trembling Before G-d DVD edition with three hours of special features.

DuBowski directed Trembling on the Road, a 40-minute featurette - a dramatic document of dialogues, protests, reactions, and events — by turns poignant, funny, angry, interesting — from the worldwide tour of Trembling Before G-d. While for many, Trembling Before G-d was "dare to despair," Trembling on the Road documents how the film profoundly touched and transformed the lives of individuals, their families, communities, rabbis and teachers.

DuBowski also created:

Petach Lev - The Trembling Israeli Education Project — interviews with a group of the facilitators telling the stories of their groundbreaking work.

More With the Rabbis - Excerpts from interviews with a number of prestigious Orthodox rabbis about the issue of homosexuality —. Rabbi Aharon Feldman, Rabbi Aron Tendler, Rabbi Shlomo Riskin, Rabbi Meir Fund and Rabbi Dr. Nathan Lopes Cardozo.

More with Rabbi Steve Greenberg - The story of a religious leader's twenty years of struggle to come out.

Interview with the Director — The story behind the story, how a film became a movement, and the challenges met in creating this landmark work.

Mark: The Musical - What if MTV did a spiritual music video? Mark sings his way through Jerusalem's Hasidic neighborhoods. Includes rare footage of the Hasidic world from Israel, Madison Square Garden, and Brooklyn.

Behind The Silhouettes - The making of the silhouettes — only at the end of the film is it revealed that the Orthodox gay and lesbian community came together to form their image behind the screen. The story of turning a soundstage into a virtual shtetl and how invisibility was illuminated.

Shlomo on Donahue - The first mass media gay Orthodox moment when Shlomo from Trembling Before G-d is on Donahue in 1985.

What is The Atonement Ceremony for Sexual Sins? - Rabbi Steve Greenberg guides us through the atonement ceremony for sexual sins depicted in the film. Why the ice cubes? Why the blowing of the shofar, the ram's horn?

Tomboychik - Director's short film - DuBowski's first film. A series of intimate video vignettes depicting the fierce love between Malverna and Sandi, 88 and 22, grandmother and grandson. The two playmates dress up drag-esque for this moving portrait of a woman's struggle with gender and sexuality. Since Malverna's death, Tomboychik has become a living memorial to the intensity of her spirit. Winner Golden Gate Award for Best Short Documentary, San Francisco Film Festival.

An International Resource Guide for Orthodox GLBT Jews - An international resource guide to Jewish GLBT websites, organizations, resources and groups.

Subtitles in Spanish, Hebrew, and Yiddish to allow the film to have greater reach and impact.

(source: Trembling Before G-d website )

International

While the project focused enormous effort on U.S. and Israel, it was critical to seed the conversation about homosexuality in the world's largest Jewish communities. DuBowski launched Public Screenings International and organized a week-long or month-long series of screenings and programs in the the UK, Brazil, Argentina, Mexico, Canada, Australia, South Africa, Ukraine, Czech Republic, and Hungary.

South Africa is an example of the impact Public Screenings International had. With The Labia and Nu Metro, South Africa's largest film exhibitor, DuBowski, South Africa organizers David Bilchitz and Sheryl Ozinksky and Rabbi Greenberg launched a Trembling Before G-d theatrical release in cinemas in Cape Town and Johannesburg in February 2005. The Beth Din or The Rabbinical Court of South Africa and the Board of Jewish Education tried to shut it down in every way possible. They prevented Trembling from advertising in any Jewish establishment. They stopped Rabbi Greenberg and DuBowski from speaking at the Jewish high schools. They threatened to remove the kosher license of a social hall that hosted the two. They cancelled a screening at the Chief Rabbi's Community Center. When they tried to stop Rabbi Greenberg's book launch at Johannesburg's Jewish community center, the team threatened to sue under South Africa's Constitution, which protects against discrimination based on sexual orientation. The rabbis' censorship backfired, catalyzing a month of national press attention — two features in The Sunday Times, The Cape Times, The Mail & Guardian, and the Afrikaans press, front-page stories in South Africa's Jewish weekly and a stream of letters to the editors and Op-Eds, and repeated appearances on TV and call-in shows on South Africa's most popular radio stations.

Thousands of people came to diverse programs they held in cinemas, universities, and cultural institutions over the course of 2 1/2 weeks. They held numerous programs at the cinemas with a wide range of panelists of diverse faiths, sexualities, and races - from the Imam of Pretoria Mosque to the Secretary-General of the Dutch Reform Church to openly gay judges to an African lesbian healer to a Methodist Bishop to an openly gay Imam - that were met with high audience attendance and engagement. They held special screenings for black township gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender youth at Cape Town's Triangle Project. Rabbi Steve Greenberg led evenings of teaching at the Cape Town Jewish Museum and Gitlin Library, Johannesburg's WITS Institute for Social and Economic Research, and at the University of Cape Town. They held a Friday night Shabbat celebration for GLBT Jews in Johannesburg. DuBowski conducted a screening and workshop over two days at University of Witwatersand in Johannesburg, and screenings at University of the Western Cape (predominantly black and mixed-race) and Stellenbosch University (predominantly Afrikaans).

A new Jewish GLBT organization in South Africa — Jewish OutLook - was birthed through the process and a group of people planned to bring Limmud — a pluralistic Jewish learning conference to South Africa to open a space in the community for discussions around issues such as this one — which occurred in August 2007. And the community held a debate after DuBowski's and Rabbi Greenberg's departure where the Beth Din had to defend themselves for the choices they had made. At a debate addressing the Orthodox rabbinate's refusal to engage with Rabbi Greenberg, Rabbi Rappaport of the Beth Din said, "What we are opposed to is people espousing things that are contrary to Judaism and mankind coming to talk to our children. I have the right to defend myself before a robber kills me — it is my duty to protect my child from spiritual murder." Justice Dennis Davis replied, "Have we become a theocracy with the Orthodox community running the show where there is only one view and one truth? That is the concern."

In Mexico City too, the issue was so taboo that Trembling's screening was stopped at El Deportivo — the Jewish Community Center. Luis Perelman of bookstore El Amario Abierto stepped in and hosted DuBowski's and Rabbi Greenberg's screenings and teach-in's despite the formal communal pressure. One year later, Trembling was invited to Mexico's First Jewish Film Festival — the screening was attended by over 800 people. In Baltimore too, Trembling went from being protested by a number of Orthodox Jews (and Evangelical Christians) when it opened at The Charles Theater, but a year later was invited to screen for Baltimore's first Orthodox synagogue screening at Beth Tfiloh Congregation. What was once beyond the pale became discussed and even embraced in the mainstream of the community. Trembling created a tipping point across the Jewish world.

(Source: Trembling Before G-d website)

Festivals

Mayor's Prize for the Jewish Experience, Jerusalem Film Festival

GLAAD Media Award for Best Documentary Grand Jury Prize for Best Documentary, OUTFEST Los Angeles

Henry Hampton Award for Excellence in Film and Digital Media, Council on Foundations

Independent Spirit Awards for the IFC/Directv Truer Than Fiction Award, Nomination

International Federation of Film Societies, Special Mention, Berlin Film Festival

Best Documentary, Turin Gay and Lesbian Film Festival, Italy

Audience Award, Pink Apple Film Festival, Switzerland

Vito Russo Award, The New Festival, New York

American Library Association, Winner, Notable Films for Adults

Cast

Mark

Simcha Leib Productions and Turbulent Arts present in Association with Keshet Broadcasting Ltd. (Israel) in co-production with Pretty Pictures (Paris) and Cinephil Ltd (Tel Aviv)

Trembling Before G-d

a film by Sandi Simcha DuBowski

Produced by Sandi Simcha DuBowski and Marc Smolowitz

In Creative Collaboration with and Edited by Susan Korda

Director/Producer: Sandi Simcha DuBowski

Producer: Marc Smolowitz

Editor: Susan Korda

Commissioning Editor: Johanna Prenner for Keshet Broadcasting, Ltd., Israel

Co-Producer and International Sales Agent: Philippa Kowarsky, (Cinephil, Ltd. Tel Aviv)

Co-Producer James Velaise, (Pretty Pictures, Paris)

Composer: John Zorn

Music Supervisor: Carole Sue Baker and Jon L. Fine, Ocean Park Music Group

Post Production Supervisor: Lizzie Donahue