Mendel

Alexander Rosler’s semi-autobiographical, coming-of-age story is both extremely moving and comic. The family of 9-year-old Mendel (superbly portrayed by Thomas Jungling Sorenson) emigrates from Germany to Norway in the 1950s. His father, mother and older brother are haunted by nightmares of their Holocaust experiences and try to shield Mendel from the lingering horror. Mendel insists on prying into their mysterious bouts of depression as he is introduced firsthand to anti-Semitism, cod liver oil, Santa Claus and Jesus Christ. Mendel and his family struggle as strangers in a strange land in a familiar yet freshly deciphered tale of physical and spiritual displacement.