Intimate Stranger (1991)

Alan Berliner's maternal grandfather – a Palestinian Jew who lived in Egypt and was a cotton buyer for the Japanese prior to World War II. With Hitler s armies just miles away from Alexandria, Cassuto s family is split in half. They reunite in New York after the war but Cassuto decides to move to Japan, virtually abandoning his wife and children in the U.S. while he pursues his business interests and a life-long love affair with Japanese culture. Seventeen years after his death, Berliner has constructed a poetic and emotional jigsaw puzzle out of the voluminous memorabilia of his grandfather s life story.

An interesting character study of the film-maker's maternal grandfather. The man was a stranger not only to his grandson, but even it seems to those who knew him well. A Jewish man from Egypt, he seemed to feel most at home in the world with his Japanese business partners.

Comprised almost entirely of old home movies and still photos, with overlaid with voice overs of family and friends, it is a portrait an enigma; beloved by his business associates, but resented by his family, who felt ignored and forgotten. Autocratic at home, gregarious while playing at being a diplomat. And maybe even a little crazy.

Beautifully made, it gets us deeply involved in the riddle of a total stranger, even if it always stays , like the man, slightly distanced.

IMDB Reviewer

5% recovery record included
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