Shlomi Elkabetz

Directing

Shlomi Elkabetz

Born 1972-12-05 · Shchuna D, Be'er Sheva, Israele

Shlomi Elkabetz (Hebrew: שלומי אלקבץ; born 5 December 1972) is an Israeli actor, writer and director. Elkabetz is best known for his Vivian Amsalem trilogy comprising the films, To Take a Wife, Shiva and Gett: The Trial of Viviane Amsalem. Elkabetz co-wrote and co-directed the films with his older sister, Ronit Elkabetz, who also starred in the films as Viviane Amsalem, an unhappy Israeli housewife trapped in a marriage with a pious man she cannot stand. The films were loosely based on the relationship between the Elkabetz's parents. Description above from the Wikipedia article Shlomi Elkabetz, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.

Acting credits

Behind the camera

Gett: The Trial of Viviane Amsalem poster
7.5

The trial story of Viviane Amsalem's five year fight to obtain her divorce in front of the only legal authority competent for divorce cases in Israel, the Rabbinical Court.

Gett: The Trial of Viviane Amsalem

2014

Gett: The Trial of Viviane Amsalem poster
7.5

The trial story of Viviane Amsalem's five year fight to obtain her divorce in front of the only legal authority competent for divorce cases in Israel, the Rabbinical Court.

Gett: The Trial of Viviane Amsalem

2014

Gett: The Trial of Viviane Amsalem poster
7.5

The trial story of Viviane Amsalem's five year fight to obtain her divorce in front of the only legal authority competent for divorce cases in Israel, the Rabbinical Court.

Gett: The Trial of Viviane Amsalem

2014

Black Notebooks poster
6.5

With this two-part feature documentary, Shlomi Elkabetz shares a poignant love letter to his sister, the late actress and director Ronit Elkabetz, and delivers a rare cinematic experience.

Black Notebooks

2021

To Take A Wife poster
6.4

The story takes place in Haifa, Israel, in 1979, during three days before the Shabbat. A young woman trying to raise three children, work from home, and observe the strict Moroccan traditions of her family finds herself at constant odds with her husband and her brothers, who want her to stay married and leave behind the notions of being loved and free.

To Take A Wife

2004

To Take A Wife poster
6.4

The story takes place in Haifa, Israel, in 1979, during three days before the Shabbat. A young woman trying to raise three children, work from home, and observe the strict Moroccan traditions of her family finds herself at constant odds with her husband and her brothers, who want her to stay married and leave behind the notions of being loved and free.

To Take A Wife

2004

No artwork available
NR

Zohar, a young dancer, arrives in Berlin to visit her best friend Shira. She meets Gillen, an insecure German poet, and together with Shira’s boyfriend, the four form a friendship that, for a moment, makes anything seem possible. But as the bond between Zohar and Gillen deepens, the bubble they have built around themselves begins to unravel. When a violent incident reveals sides of each other, they had never seen before, the two refuse to let go. What begins as an attempt to repair their relationship, culminates in an intimate and extreme event that will change them both. An intimate portrait of young people searching for belonging and meaning in the world, struggling with the gap between fantasy and reality.

I Can't Say No to Myself

2026

In Between poster
7.0

The film captures the daily duality of three young Palestinian women in Tel Aviv, caught between hometown tradition and big city abandon, and the price they must pay for a lifestyle that seems obvious to many: the freedom to work, party, have sex, and choose.

In Between

2016

No artwork available
NR

Mali Azulai (38), a bus inspector in Ashkelon, is on the verge of losing her job after a violent altercation with a teenage passenger. When she returns to an empty bus to retrieve the body camera she left behind, she finds an abandoned baby on the floor and decides to take him home. Her brother Shimon (32), a prison guard struggling through a marital crisis, joins her, and the two shut themselves away with the child. His presence stirs the siblings’ shared wound of abandonment, as long-buried secrets come to light. When the baby falls ill and a hospital visit becomes unavoidable, Mali is forced to choose, hold on or let go and face the cost.

Heart Of Gold

2026

In the Desert: A Documentary Diptych poster
NR

In close proximity and yet without any points of contact: In the West Bank, Israeli settlers and Palestinian farmers live next door to each other - and yet in separate worlds. Omar takes his Palestinian family from their town house to the barren slopes of Mount Hebron, where they are supposed to help look after his sheep farm. The Jewish settler Avidan has settled in the immediate vicinity with a group of like-minded people in order to raise sheep in the desolate land. Avner Faingulernt documents these hermetic worlds in a radical but logical form: as two separate films that only unfold their full effect when viewed as a diptych.

In the Desert: A Documentary Diptych

2018

No artwork available
NR

Neo was three and a half years old when a devastating car accident left him with a severe brainstem injury. After five days suspended between life and death, he wakes up unable to breathe, speak, walk, or eat on his own. In the hospital, his parents, Lior and Galit, pick up a camera and never put it down. Shaped from hundreds of hours of intimate footage, 'I Am Neo' is a portrait of a child and his family slowly rebuilding their lives, revealing both the fragility of life, and the strength of the human spirit.

I Am Neo

2026

Sarah poster
NR

After leaving the ultra-Orthodox world, 21-year-old Sarah sets out on a five-year journey, sparked by a raw, intimate expression of female vulnerability: an unplanned pregnancy. Without a permanent home, her changing body dictates the rhythm of her life as she moves between temporary apartments. Motherhood forces her to face herself, while the past she fled resurfaces. Caught between constant motion and inner withdrawal, Sarah struggles to form a new identity and find a place to call home.

Sarah

2026

Heritage poster
3.3

Noam, a young gay man, discovers that his father, who just died, had a secret affair with a married man. He follows and meets that man. He now holds his father’s secret.

Heritage

2017

The Seven Days poster
6.4

The Ohaion family is mourning the death of one of their relatives. In keeping with tradition, they gather together in the home of the deceased and stay there for seven days. Forced to put up with one another day and night, the brothers and sisters soon let their bitterness and arguments override the sense of communal reverence. The atmosphere becomes unbearable and long-buried truths finally surface.

The Seven Days

2008

The Seven Days poster
6.4

The Ohaion family is mourning the death of one of their relatives. In keeping with tradition, they gather together in the home of the deceased and stay there for seven days. Forced to put up with one another day and night, the brothers and sisters soon let their bitterness and arguments override the sense of communal reverence. The atmosphere becomes unbearable and long-buried truths finally surface.

The Seven Days

2008

Eid poster
4.0

Eid, a young Bedouin from Rahat, spends his nights in Skype calls with Dounia, a married Arab actress living in Paris. Dounia is both his audience and his muse for a play he is writing about his life. When his parents force him to marry a woman he doesn’t know, Eid fears he will not be able to complete his dream. Eid will try to change his fate, determine the ending of his play himself, and tell his story—even if no one is there to listen.

Eid

2024

Je t’aime Ronit Elkabetz poster
NR

An archival montage of late Israeli director and actress Ronit Elkabetz, as told through the radical collection of her extraordinary wardrobe. A cinematic essay about the power of cinema, the power of clothes, and one unforgettable woman standing for and embodying the deepest human desire for freedom and liberty.

Je t’aime Ronit Elkabetz

2022

Cuz You're Ugly poster
6.0

Avigail, an overweight and insecure 18-year-old midshipwoman, returns home to the stuffy apartment in Jerusalem which she shares with her dysfunctional mother and with her young sister. Avigail hopes to untie the chains of her childhood, But something else happens when she returns home: Her young sister got knocked up. Now, instead of getting rid of her virginity- she has to get rid of a baby.

Cuz You're Ugly

2026

Edut poster
9.0

Palestinian testimonies collected after the second Intifada revealed a harsh daily life reality that, for Israelis, had always belonged to the "others" - the Palestinians - and hence was denied. A few years later, trespassing what had been taboo until then, Israeli officers who served during the Intifada told of their memories. Memories of violence, of suffering, of humiliation. The stories from both sides matched. Against the backdrop of local empty landscapes, an Israeli officer remembers... a Palestinian civilian remembers as well. A journey into the collective memory of Palestine and Israel takes place.

Edut

2011

Shooting Life poster
9.0

A film teacher has to teach in Sderot and change the lives of his students.

Shooting Life

2018

Know Hope poster
NR

Israeli street-artist Addam Yekutieli kept his anonymity and signed his works with the pseudonym "Know Hope". He began drawing human-like characters that rapidly gained attention and granted him the title the "Israeli Banksy". But when he experiences an eruption of autoimmune arthritis, he is forced to rethink his artwork in light of his new physical disability. The film documents moments in which a personal human drama generates art and political action. The anonymity of the hit-and-run street artist is replaced with intensive and intimate social interactions, exploring how painful memories and experiences may be alleviated through art.

Know Hope

2025