Sholom Aleichem

Russia, 1905. Tuvia is the only Jew living in the village of Antevka. He is very poor but things change when, as a token of gratitude for a service rendered, he is given a cow and some food. Now, his wife, his seven daughters and himself have access to a better life. Tuvia sells his milk and his butter. Moreover, he is now able to give his daughters a dowry and marry them. But you can't buy happiness...

An amazing story about how Tevye the Dairyman, a poor man burdened with a family, was suddenly made happy by an extraordinary event, one worthy of description. It is told by Tevye himself and passed on word for word.

This 1919 silent is the first American film based on the same Sholem Aleichem stories as Fiddler on the Roof, but produced 50 years before the blockbuster musical. Unlike most adaptations of Aleichem’s work, Broken Barriers (Khavah) focuses not on Tevye the milkman, but on his daughter Khavah, who falls in love with the gentile boy Fedka and must navigate the reverberations from this with both her community and her family.

Russia, 1905. Tuvia is the only Jew living in the village of Antevka. He is very poor but things change when, as a token of gratitude for a service rendered, he is given a cow and some food. Now, his wife, his seven daughters and himself have access to a better life. Tuvia sells his milk and his butter. Moreover, he is now able to give his daughters a dowry and marry them. But you can't buy happiness...

An amazing story about how Tevye the Dairyman, a poor man burdened with a family, was suddenly made happy by an extraordinary event, one worthy of description. It is told by Tevye himself and passed on word for word.

This 1919 silent is the first American film based on the same Sholem Aleichem stories as Fiddler on the Roof, but produced 50 years before the blockbuster musical. Unlike most adaptations of Aleichem’s work, Broken Barriers (Khavah) focuses not on Tevye the milkman, but on his daughter Khavah, who falls in love with the gentile boy Fedka and must navigate the reverberations from this with both her community and her family.