‘Working Woman’ Review by Peter Belsito
A Jerusalem woman’s business career is ruined by her boss’ aggressive sexual behavior in this powerful Israeli drama.
The person who believes there’s never any excuse for putting up with the boss’s sexual harassment has probably never experienced any, let alone risked losing a position or needed salary if they complain.
Most women — and people in general — don’t have any choice but to put up with “a certain amount” of crap to get ahead at all and often is a real career advancement choice.
That’s the fix the heroine of Working Woman finds herself in: She’s wedged between the need for a job that greatly improves her young family’s prospects and the increasingly discomfiting behavior of her superior.
This second narrative feature by Israeli documentarian Michal Aviad is a strong drama that eschews melodramatic contrivance, making its points via cool (yet sometimes squirm-inducing) observation.
At the start, Orna (Liron Ben Shlush of “Next to Her”) is excited about making a significant career change as assistant to major-league Israeli building developer Benny (Menashe Noy).
She has no background in real estate, but talked her way into the position, and immediately proves she’s got the resourcefulness, drive, organizational skills and original ideas to be more than a glorified secretary.
Indeed, Benny is soon rewarding her accordingly with a promotion, particularly once her high-school French proves key in winning over wealthy Gallic buyers to a massive residential project that’s his biggest gamble to date.
In the immediate aftermath of that success, he grabs her for a non-platonic kiss, a move she soundly rejects.
He apologizes, vowing the next day that nothing of the kind will ever happen again.
Orna has many pressing reasons to take him at his word: Not only does she need this job to commence a new career path, but her chef husband Ofer (Oshri Cohen) has just opened a new restaurant that isn’t doing well, making their financial situation (with young children to support) precarious.
As she’s now handling apartment sales for Benny, working for him promises fat commissions on top of her salary, as well as a prestigious résumé item that might take her anywhere she wants later on.
Thus Orna has little choice but to ignore continued red flags around her boss’s behavior. A business trip to Paris results in a violent rape depicted in an excruciating hotel-room scene.
This has the extended effect of putting her marriage in crisis when her husband discovers this and her business success threatened by Benny’s business dominance over her.
Director Aviad and her co-writers manage a resolution that is satisfying without stretching credibility, when Orna bravely brings a letter of job recommendation for Benny to sign for her as she tells him she’s quitting.
She leaves, letter signed, knowing she’s gotten out of this situation the best she could.
See the trailer here.
Reviewed at Toronto Film Festival (Contemporary World Cinema), Sept. 11, 2018. (Also in Busan, Jerusalem, Vancouver, Calgary, Mill Valley fests.)
U.S. Distributor: Zeitgeist
Running time: 94 MIN.
Original title: Isha Ovedet
PRODUCTION: (Israel) A Zeitgeist, Kino Lorber release (in U.S.) of a United King Films presentation of a Lama Films production. (Int’l sales: M-Appeal, Berlin.) Producers: Amir Harel, Ayetlet Kait.
Director: Michal Aviad. Screenplay: Sharon Azulay Eyal, Michal Vinik, Aviad. Camera (color, widescreen, HD): Daniel Miller. Editor: Nili Feller.
Cast: Liron Ben Shlush, Menashe Noy, Oshri Cohen, Irit Sheleg, Dorit Lev-Ari, Gilles Ben-David, Corinne Hayat. (Hebrew, French, English dialogue.)
