Red Cow (2018)

Benny, 17, lives in a Jewish community on the West Bank under the excessive authority of her pious father, a Messianic Jew, who has almost lost his mind looking for the red cow, the sacrifice of which is mentioned in the Torah. Benny finds escape in forbidden lesbian relationships with her friend. 

The film is made with regards to the conventions of contemporary European independent films and reminds the Turkish sensation Mustang by Deniz Gamze Ergüven. Tsivia Barkai Yacov, the film’s director, said that the story told in the film is almost entirely autobiographical: she used to live in such a community and was in a relationship with a girlfriend. By contrasting teenage exploration of sexual identity and zealous search for the sacred cow, Barkai Yacov shows that no matter how different people are, they are going to try to find themselves, but old traditions are inevitably going to confine young minds.