Daily Podcasts Video Research

‘We weren’t even considered Jewish’: Documentary searches for filmmaker’s cultural identity

star 0 Culture History

JL;DR SUMMARY Kai Balin explores his Jewish identity in the documentary 'Son of a Seeker,' following the revelation that his family's conversion wasn't recognized by the Orthodox community. A way out west there was a fella, fella I want to tell you about, fella by the name of Jeff Lebowski.

  • At least, that was the handle his lovin' parents gave him, but he never had much use for it himself.
  • This Lebowski, he called himself the Dude.
  • Now, Dude, that's a name no one would self-apply where I come from.
  • But then, there was a lot about the Dude that didn't make a whole lot of sense to me.
  • And a lot about where he lived, likewise. But then again, maybe that's why I found the place s'durned innarestin'.
JL;DR members get full summaries and key points of all podcast episodes in the archive, including this one. Donate & listen smarter »

Tags

HolocaustJewish IdentityOrthodox JudaismConservative JudaismDocumentaryConversionFamily HistoryPersonal JourneyCultural ExplorationReligious Acceptance

Places mentioned

Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
"He was raised in Vancouver's Jewish community, attended the Talmud Torah and King David High School."
Toronto, Ontario, Canada
"It has its Toronto premiere on August 20th."
Romania
"saying a Jewish prayer of gratitude last year while he stands in a long-neglected cemetery in Romania at the grave belonging to his paternal Jewish great-grandfather"
Poland
"His deeply personal quest to find out how Jewish he truly is and whether that matters is the subject of his first feature-length documentary called Son of a Seeker."
Hungary
"The Son of a Seeker film is the result of his trip that spanned three continents, including stops in Poland, Hungary, Romania, Italy and Israel,"
Italy
"His family were prominent members of the Reform synagogue, Temple Shalom."
Israel
"So I actually started filming in about August of 2024."
Nashville, Tennessee, United States
"He was working as a waiter in Nashville, Tennessee, and at the time, like many diaspora Jews in the immediate aftermath of the Hamas attack on Israel."
This podcast episode was indexed and curated by Cairo, JL;DR's web crawler.
Cairo Item ID 59408
Cairo Source ID 72
Retrieved 2025-08-16 05:30:45 UTC
Curated 2025-08-16 06:02:38 UTC