Working Woman

Working Woman follows wife and mother-of-three Orna (Liron Ben Shlush) as she begins working as a personal assistant to a successful real estate developer (Menashe Noy’s Benny), with Orna’s initial success in the position eventually (and persistently) threatened by Benny’s entirely unwanted advances. There’s ultimately not much more to the story aside from that brief synopsis, as director Michal Aviad, working from a script written with Sharon Azulay Eyal and Michal Vinik, delivers a kitchen-sink slice-of-life story that relies mostly on small, character-based events to propel the thin narrative forward – with the down-to-earth vibe certainly heightened and perpetuated by Shlush’s often engrossing turn as the beleaguered protagonist. And while the movie’s subject matter is certainly quite topical, Working Woman‘s exceedingly (and often excessively) deliberate pace prevents it from making the impact that Aviad has obviously intended – with the ongoing emphasis on mundane happenings exacerbating the movie’s hands-off atmosphere. It’s fairly apparent, then, that Working Woman does manage to grow more and more interesting as it progresses, with the increasingly strained relationship between Shlush and Noy’s respective characters providing the movie’s second half with some much-needed dramatic tension. The solid closing stretch ensures, in the end, that the film ends on a satisfyingly empowering note, and yet it’s difficult not to wish Aviad had infused Working Woman with a slightly more propulsive feel.

**1/2 out of ****