Documentary in Development, 2025
Director: Dorit Muzicant

MISHPOCHE is the story of an extended Jewish patchwork family that includes stepmothers, stepfathers, former partners, halfsiblings and people who aren’t siblings by blood but share a similar bond through the circumstances of their lives.

This family might be many things, but it is by no means conventional. How often do people of Jewish heritage marry a non-Jewish partner, have children with them, then realise that something is lacking? Then meet someone Jewish and fall in love, despite being pregnant with their (current, soon to be ex) partner’s child? Then split up with their non-Jewish partner, have children with their new Jewish partner and bring up the children from three different marriages together? And then, just to add to the challenges: Why not add a few foster children, ideally Muslim ones, to create the perfect cocktail?

At the heart of the story lies the love between Marguerite (70) and Ronny (73). Their romance begins just as Marguerite is pregnant with her third child from her first marriage. Despite the inauspicious beginnings, the two of them make a go of it. Ronny and Marguerite end their first marriages, which have brought forth five children in total, and embark on a new life together. They have three sons, then get married – this time, in the Jewish faith.

Today, all eight children (and the couple’s three foster children) are grown up, and Ronny and Marguerite are grandparents many times over. MISHPOCHE is the story of the ups and downs of such a turbulent family history, and of how Ronny and Marguerite were able to whether the many challenges they faced.

Marguerite and Ronny are the two central protagonists. They are the point at which all the threads come together to form the starting point of this vast familial tapestry. But who are other central figures in this unusual family? Who assumes which position, and what does this mean for the greater whole? What role does religion play in all this? Who lives by which faith – and why? What effect did the 7 October attacks have, and how does one deal with the anti-Semitism that has increasingly reared its ugly head since then?

The quest for answers to all these questions and more is presented in everyday scenes that capture both the highlights of family life and the phases during which the pressures of terror, war and displacement appear almost insurmountable.

MISHPOCHE is the true story of a patchwork family that embodies the spirit of inclusion and tolerance in every aspect of life, be it religious, political or emotional.