The Giraffe

An ambitious thriller that's undermined by some stiff performances but tackles provocative issues of identity and responsibility. Businessman David Fish (director/co-screenwriter Dani Levy) is a New Yorker chafing at his Orthodox Jewish family's proscriptive beliefs. Lena Katz (co-scripter Maria Schrader) also lives in New York; she's forced to examine her Jewish heritage when her family's factory in Germany is torched by neo-Nazis. Coincidence appears to bring David and Lena together. Lena's mother, Ruth (Nicole Heesters), is in town to celebrate her birthday; Lena comes by Ruth's hotel and finds a middle-aged woman crumpled in the hallway, bloody and unconscious....