This is the 1933American sound adaptation of the Polish silent Tkies kaf (1924),featuring two of Poland's best-known Yiddish divas, Ida Kaminska and hermother, Ester-Rokhl Kaminska (the latter's only film appearance herepreserved). A fashionably expressionistic, rather more lightheartedprecursor to themes in The Dybbuk, set in early twentieth-century JewishLithuania, Tkies kaf addresses the classic conflict betweentraditionalism and modernism in a tale of frustrated love and spiritualintervention. Two young people, a yeshiva student and a poorfruitseller, though promised to each other before birth, can fulfilltheir love only through the miraculous intervention of the prophetElijah, who appears in a variety of disguises. Popular, and criticallycontroversial-accused of playing into the Gentiles' image of Jews asuninhibited gluttons (in the humorous wedding scene), as uncanny (itsthesis)-the film fascinates with on-location scenes in old Vilna, wherelocal beggars became extras and Jewish landmarks were worked into theplot.