The Thousands

A based-on-a-true-story film about Orthodox Jewish ecstasy smugglers invites the assumption that it’s a rollicking rave caper, a tense crime thriller or a quirky coming-of-age fable. Holy Rollers is none of these. Surprisingly gritty and detached as it follows a young man striving to find his niche, it reminded me of James Gray’s 2009 film Two Lovers.

Jesse Eisenberg brings his trademark autistic nervousness to young Hasid Sam Gold, whose meek attempts to assert himself are foiled by his father (Mark Ivanir, channelling Jackie Mason), his rabbi (Bern Cohen), and even his sister (Eisenberg’s real-life sister Hallie Kate). When Sam’s badass neighbour Yosef Zimmerman (Justin Bartha) recruits him on an all-expenses-paid trip to Amsterdam to bring back “medicine for rich people”, Yosef’s boss Jackie Solomon (Danny A Abeckaser) finds Sam amusingly ‘pure’… at least according to Jackie’s girlfriend Rachel (Ari Graynor), whose intentions for Sam seem anything but.

For me, Yosef is the most intriguing character. Charming, hedonistic and increasingly reckless, he lacks Sam’s religious angst yet grieves his estrangement from his pious brother Leon (Jason Fuchs). And at the film’s climax, Yosef seems more pitifully naïve than his protégé. Bartha was wasted in the Hangover movies.