Yentl (film) - Themes

Themes

Yentl begins with the same premise as Singer's original story. Streisand's character finds herself born into the wrong sex, a woman with the "soul of a man." Her talent, curiosity and ambition are considered strictly masculine by her society and religious tradition. Unwilling to live with the drudgery of life as a woman, Yentl leaves her home and conceals her gender to be able to pursue the scholarly occupation of a Jewish man. In doing so, Yentl inadvertently embarks on a journey of self-discovery that will defy simple definition and transcend traditional notions of gender and sexual identity.

Yentl's defiance of social expectation and her reversal of traditional gender roles crosses deeply rooted religious boundaries, particularly once Yentl marries Hadass. Until this point, Yentl only adopts the appearance and occupation of a man, but now she lives as man in a more complete sense, as a husband, occupying the traditionally male role in her household. Her identity as a woman, not only socially and religiously, but also personally and sexually, is called into question, as she occupies this role and develops an intimate, loving connection with Hadass, complete with hinted sexual chemistry.

In Singer's story, this dual betrayal of nature and the divine plan dooms Yentl to a life of pain, alienation, and shameful dishonesty. After her marriage ends in disaster, Yentl remains trapped forever in her disguise, unable to find redemption from her rejection of a normal life—a take on the legend of the Wandering Jew.

In Streisand's film, Yentl's defiance of expectation and definition, a rejection of clear categories of gender and sexuality, is treated as a virtue. Though Yentl faces difficult choices in her attempt to live the life of her choosing, including sacrificing her love of Avigdor, she finds herself capable of following her dreams, of feeling different forms of love and intimacy with both sexes, and of emerging from confusion and ambiguity with a powerful, independent sense of self. At the film’s conclusion, Yentl takes this developed, ever-evolving self to America to seek new possibilities and opportunities for discovery. Singer criticized the film's ending as hopelessly unrealistic, but the ending serves more as an affirmation of Yentl's independence and relentless optimism than a historically fitting conclusion to the narrative.

Throughout her complex interaction with Hadass and Avigdor, Yentl manages conflict with empathy and respect. Her difficult experiences expand, rather than trap her personality. She does not conform to expectations from her surroundings or from her audience, neither remaining merely a woman hiding in men’s clothing nor revealing herself to be neutered or firmly homosexual. She refuses to accept a limited, traditional life, even when offered one in marriage to Avigdor. Rather, Yentl becomes a “real woman,” thoroughly modern and encompassing “what society has defined as both masculine and feminine traits." In the end, her pain, her confusion and her loss never destroy her hope or resolve. She remains assertive and defiant, daring to find or to create room for new self-definition and new possibility, without seeking simple or complete resolution to ongoing challenges in her constant thirst for more.

Though Isaac Singer insists that Yentl does not have feminist undertones, many critics and viewers of the film consider Yentl to be a feminist role model. One reason is that she rebels against patriarchal Orthodox Jewish society by disguising herself as a man to do what she loves – study Torah. Another reason is that although she finds herself in love with Avigdor, she has the strength to leave him behind, in exchange for a freer life in the US.

Jewish-American Themes

Streisand’s interpretation of I.B. Singer’s “Yentl the Yeshiva Boy” has philosophical implications as a Jewish-American film. Streisand changed Singer’s specific ending, in which Yentl wanders off presumably to a different yeshiva to continue her studies and her cross-dressing. In the film interpretation of the story, Yentl moves on, but this time to the US. Viewers are led to believe that in the States she can have both study and womanhood. This idea symbolizes a refusal to conform to old-world Jewish standards and instead move “against the authority and authenticity of the Judaic past,” which Streisand asserts has “propelled itself so far from the austerity of Talmudic study.”

Often Jewish-American immigrants who struck out on their own were unable to dedicate the amount of time and energy into text study that their ancestors had. Their lives instead were characterized by an “individualism and experimentalism” that “Jewish immigrants and their descendants have so strikingly honored, reinforced, and revised.” The differences between the written version of this story, which originated in Warsaw, and the American film interpretation thus symbolize a potential philosophical shift from the self-understanding of Eastern-European Jewry to Jewish-American self-understanding. It suggests America can potentially alter preexisting Jewish values.

Heterosexual Themes

Yentl blurs lines between male and female and its characters develop attractions that could be figured as homosexual, although the film upholds a heterosexual sensibility. Yentl’s desire is exclusively for her study partner, Avigdor, while her marriage to a woman remains unconsummated and comic throughout the film. Because Yentl chooses to reveal herself as a woman to Avigdor in hopes of gaining his love, Yentl firmly establishes herself as a heterosexual female force in the film

While Yentl does not take its characters outside the realm of heterosexuality, the film critically questions the “appropriateness of sex roles” as determined by society. Ultimately it argues that the society Yentl lived in does not allow equal opportunities for happiness for all people, especially women. In this way, it can be read as a heterosexual yet potentially feminist text.