Sh’Chur

Cheli, a successful Israeli television personality, receives the news that her father has died and must immediately return to her childhood home for the funeral. She prepares for the journey and brings her young daughter Ruth, who is autistic. Along the way, Cheli is forced to pick up her older sister Pnina from the institution where she has resided since young adulthood. As the three women make their way back to the development town of Cheli’s youth, she is overwhelmed by memories of her 1970s childhood.

At 13, Cheli, then Rachel, was an ambitious young girl who chafed at the role assigned to her in her Moroccan immigrant family. The family is dysfunctional and each sibling experiences trouble living up to its expectations. Her mother and older sister Pnina, who is both developmentally disabled and an extremely potent medium, attempt to remedy these problems with sh’chur (traditional magic rituals). Rachel’s brother Avram is on leave from his kibbutz, which threatens to send him to a psychologist for peeing the bed nightly. When her older brother Shlomo spots sister Zohara cavorting with a boyfriend, the family comes to the decision that it is time for her to be married. She is forced to marry her uncle Moshe, who is 20 years her senior. Zohara is distraught, leading her to attempt suicide by drinking kerosine, but she is caught and saved by the family. Meanwhile, Shlomo is pressured by Dede, the brother of his sweetheart Denise, to marry her. Shlomo refuses. Pnina is raped by Dede in revenge and eventually becomes pregnant, while Rachel has a fight with her father and is brutally beaten. A sh’chur ritual performed by their mother causes Pnina to miscarry.

The family assembles for Zohara and Moshe’s wedding. During the party, Pnina becomes upset and a freak storm appears, driving everyone else indoors. Rachel follows Pnina into the storm and berates her, telling her she wishes Pnina would get hit by a car and die. Pnina then flees into heavy traffic, where she causes a crash and is subsequently institutionalized. The rest of the siblings disperse to their original locations, and Rachel is sent off to boarding school. Upon arrival at the boarding school, Rachel abandons her previous identity altogether, introducing herself as “Cheli, from somewhere in Israel”.

In the present, after her father’s funeral, Cheli is seen wearing Pnina’s childhood amulet and telepathically communicating with her daughter Ruth. Pnina remains outside of the institution and lives with their mother, while Cheli has accepted the role of sh’chur in her life and forged a strong bond with her daughter for the first time.

Last Updated: October 05, 2025 at 12:35