Film Review: Shoshana is a nuanced exploration of a complex and volatile world

Shosana benefits hugely from an empathic but unsentimental performance by Irina Starshenbaum in its pivotal role.

Irina Starshenbaum and Douglas Booth star in Shoshana

• Shoshana
• ★★★★☆
• Cinema release

Based on a true story, Shoshana (15A) opens in Tel Aviv in 1938, with Shoshana Borochov (Irina Starshenbaum) torn between her love for British policeman Thomas Wilkin (Douglas Booth) and her fervent desire to see an Israeli state established in Palestine.

Enter Geoffrey Morton (Harry Melling), an autocratic English officer who firmly believes in what are coyly called ‘energetic measures’ when it comes to enforcing the British Mandate on the Arab and Jewish populations, and who is obsessed with capturing Avraham Stern (Aury Alby), the driving force behind the Irgun, a ‘fascistic’ underground organisation dedicated to ridding Palestine of Arabs and British alike. 

Despite its frequent eruptions of unexpected violence, Michael Winterbottom’s film is a nuanced exploration of a complex and volatile world, one in which the personal cannot be anything but political, and which benefits hugely from an empathic but unsentimental performance by Irina Starshenbaum in its pivotal role.