Freddy Olsson

Produced by Bokomotiv - De Geer & Olsson AB with support from The Swedish Film Institute, film commissioner Hjalmar Palmgren, Sveriges Television, SVT, Ulla Nilsson and Ingmar Persson and the Jewish Cultural Committé in Stockholm, Miriam Andersson.

A story of power play, cunning and courage. Esther saves the Jewish people from destruction in their Persian captivity.

The Jewish holiday of Purim was instituted to celebrate Esther’s people’s escape from anihilation.

For 15 years, Esaias Baitel has been photographing the celebration of Purim in Jerusalem. For 24 hours the world is turned upside down and Jewish scholars lay aside the Torah to enter deeply into the contents of bottles. With music and sound from the festivities, The Book of Esther recreates the chaos of happiness, intoxication and faith that is the essence of Purim.

The film is also a reminder that the Holocaust of the twentieth century was not an isolated occurrence.

Esaias Baitel was born in Trelleborg, Sweden, in 1948. After graduating from Uppsala University, he has lived abroad and in the ensuing twenty-five years established himself as a world-class photographer. In 2003, his filmThe Zone, about street gangs in Paris, premièred. The Zone has been entered in several large festivals and was awarded best short documentary in Karlovy Vary, the Czech Republic.