Shneiders … men of the cloth

Although shneider, meaning tailor, is a common name in the Jewish community, I can’t say I have ever personally known one. I do, however, remember a scene from “Fiddler on the Roof,” when shouts of “It’s here! It’s here!” rang out in celebration of an arrival — the arrival of a baby, the audience is led to think. In fact, it is the arrival of Motl the tailor’s long awaited Singer sewing machine.

Maybe it’s because my grandmother was a seamstress of sorts, her lips often pursed tightly holding a needle between them, a thimble capping her finger, threading a garment, that I have always had a soft spot for tailoring. That may be what drew me to “Men of Cloth,” a documentary film about master tailors and the vanishing art and craftsmanship of tailoring.

Filmed over 11-years, you get a sense of these master tailors’ craft, dedication and passion for tailoring as an art form. Tailor shops bespoke a time and place between people, a where the work depended on the talent of human hands. These men were steeped in behind the scenes, day-to-day hard work within their quiet spaces, surrounded by collections of inanimate objects: multicolored spools of thread, pins, scissors, measuring tape, buttons and books with patterns, rich mahogany tables and little makeshift dressing rooms. Their creations were labors of love.

One of the tailors spoke of his thumb regularly being bent out of shape and his ritual of tying it and sleeping on it in order to reverse the bent finger. Another spoke of the tradition of praying and meditating to succeed in his tailoring work; the work of taking a slab of fabric and bringing it to life, transforming it into a garment worn by a person, this was treated with great respect.

In the tailor shop scenes, not much is said, yet the diligence and intensity of quietly cutting and sewing were redolent with character, especially the scenes between tailor and apprentice.