Life According to Ohad

“Chicks in dumpsters, dying in pain, I can’t take it! …”

Life According to Ohad tells the true story about a vegan animal-rights activist named Ohad Cohen from Tel Aviv, Israel, who becomes estranged from his carnist family for many years over differences of opinion, values and morals when it comes to food and animals. The film underlines Ohad’s struggle as a vegan to eat meals with his family in good conscience when they are carnists and eat animals. The contradiction he feels leads Ohad to distance himself from his family and instead connect with more like-minded people who share his values and morals. For Ohad, being a vegan is not enough to alleviate the suffering animals are subjected to for food. Ohad feels compelled to do so much more and becomes involved with animal rights activism—where he does vegan outreach, rescues animals who are about to be slaughtered at a slaughterhouse, chains himself to animals’ cages to protest animal cruelty, performs public demonstrations to support animal rights, and vehemently argues with his family at the dinner table over killing animals unnecessarily for food and causing their suffering. 

Film director, Eri Daniel Erlich, travels alongside Ohad for three years in order to capture and produce this very powerful and personal documentary about Ohad. 

Film Premier: May 2014

Film Length: 1 hour, 20 min.

Film Awards

• Special Jury Mention by DocAviv Film Festival, 2014

• Official Selection, Santa Barbara Film Fest, 2015

• Official Selection, Ture/False Film Fest, 2015

• Official Selection, Crossroads Festival for Documentary Film

• Official Selection, St. Louis International Film Festival, 2015

• Official Selection, Rhode Island International Film Festival, 2015

• Official Selection, Animal Film Festival CA, 2016

• Special Jury Mention Award, Cinemambiente Film Festival, 2015

Watch the Film

Watch the film on-line: http://www.ohad-doc.com

Listen to an Interview with Ohad on KBIA Radio

Film Credits

Film Director – Eri Daniel Erlich

Producers: Elad Peleg and Haggai Arad

Story by: Eri Daniel Erlich

Cast

• Aviva Cohen
• Uzi Cohen
• Itay Cohen
• Shirly Cohen Liany
• Sharon Cohen

DECLARATION OF INTENT

by FILM DIRECTOR Eri Daniel Erlich

“There is a significant lack of understanding regarding the “over sensitive” social change activists like Ohad. This sensitivity can sometime seem like a disconnection from reality, while it’s actually those activists that are connectedto the reality (unpleasant as it is) much more than most people. 

Never before – at least in Israel – has there been a film that showed the “legal” misery that is being done to animals (in rearing them for food and experiments). Here, for the first time, we are exposed to new and radical ideas about equality and justice for all animals, which bind us to think with criticism about our day-to-day choices.

Self-thought is only possible when all the facts are presented, and here – using Ohad and his friends, living the suffering of the animals daily in the film. I tried to show a small portion of the concealed sights. The radical vegan society in Israel was never revealed, and never was her activist’s pain displayed. The animal rights topic is always silenced by the society that sees the animals as inferior, as tools for humans to use.

It’s important to note that this is not a propaganda film! It’s about a universal story of ideological disagreement and compromises that requires a dialog. Ohad may present his agenda in the most explicit way, but the film also presents the complexity of the movement and topic.

I like the viewers to have a chance of seeing the reality the same way as Ohad sees it, in his sensitivity to the institutionalized hurting of animals. I believe that after seeing it, people won’t be able to be indifferent to the injustices Ohad fights.Ohad’s authenticity and honesty are inspiring. There is no need to be an “animal enthusiast” in order to understand the pain that he is telling in his personal story.

I believe that any viewer will relate to the disgust of hurting the weak.Furthermore, the conflicts that the hero needs to cope with against the world he lives in and his own truth are relevant not only to the subject of animal abuse, but also to many more issues.

Personally, like the letter Ohad delivered to his parents, this film is my “letter.” I, like Ohad, see the world as a concoction of suffering that needs to be overthrown, and this is my way to express my stand of the matter.I’m an animal rights activist as well, and I believe that there is injustice being done here. 

As opposed to Ohad, I didn’t dare to confront my family “till the bitter end,” and the compromises I choose to accept with my (carnivore) relatives are putting me in a conflict. Do I envy Ohad for his courage to go with his principles to the end, even in the price of separation from his family, or do I try and help him with finding a compromise? Good question … “

Eri Daniel Erlich, 2014