A Tickle in the Heart

From the opening plaintive notes sounded by Max Epstein's clarinet, this documentary is pure pleasure. Max and his brothers, Willie and Julie, are to klezmer music what the Preservation Hall Jazz Band is to Dixieland jazz. For six decades, they have been the standard bearers for this folk music of the European Jewish community; first in New York where they were crowned the Kings of Klezmer, and later in the Miami senior retirement communities where they were rediscovered. From Berlin to Pinsk to Brooklyn, this stirring film traces the roots of a dying art form that has of late enjoyed a renaissance. "You play from the heart," states Willie, and so does this film. Filmed in black and white; not that it should matter. Highly recommended. (K. Lee Benson)