Told with humor, sensitivity and pain, the 20-minute film \u2014\u00a0shot almost entirely in black and white \u2014 is directed by Dana Ben-Ari, a documentarian whose previous film was \u201cBreastmilk,\u201d which The Cut describes as a \u201cgloriously graphic breast-feeding documentary<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThe Guy Who Got Cut Wrong\u201d explores Shteyngart\u2019s early years in the United States, as well as his relationship to his body, which, as a child, is \u201cjust something I really hated,\u201d he says in the film. The documentary is inspired by Shteyngart\u2019s 2021 New Yorker essay<\/a> about the same unfortunate event. The widely discussed<\/a> essay was embraced in \u201cintactivist\u201d circles opposed to circumcision<\/a>, and denounced by some Jews<\/a> who felt Shteyngart had denigrated a Jewish ritual normally performed on infants<\/a>, not 7-year-olds.<\/p>\n In the film, over a montage of photos depicting his New York City childhood \u2014 including one of him at a typewriter \u2014 Shteyngart narrates how his botched circumcision came to be. He describes arriving at a primarily Russian neighborhood in Queens, where his father was convinced by a local Chabadnik to circumcise his son in a physical manifestation of Jewish belonging.<\/p>\n Gary Shteyngart\u2019s original New Yorker article about his circumcision appeared in the Oct. 11, 2021 issue. (Jewish Week)<\/p>\n \u201cIt was not just being accepted by the religion, but it was also being accepted by the new country, which we desperately were trying to do,\u201d Shteyngart says. \u201cIf this is what you do in America, it\u2019s what you\u2019re doing in America. I\u2019m not gonna fight it.\u201d<\/p>\n But the surgical removal of his foreskin \u2014 a practice which had been banned in the Soviet Union as part of the government\u2019s anti-religion policies \u2014 didn\u2019t heal properly. \u201cThere were bits of redundant skin all over the place, just pieces of skin hanging off, basically,\u201d Shteyngart describes, adding that the injury fostered a negative relationship with his body, exacerbating the feeling of \u201cotherness\u201d that he already felt as new immigrant to the United States.<\/p>\n Ben-Ari said she was inspired to make the film after reading Shteyngart\u2019s essay. While working on \u201cBreastmilk,\u201d the issue of circumcision came up quite a bit. \u201cI spoke to so many Jewish parents and grandparents who were so conflicted and tortured by this,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n The filmmaker and its subject have \u201coverlapping backgrounds,\u201d Ben-Ari said \u2014\u00a0she was born in Israel to Russian parents; like Shteyngart she immigrated to New York as a child.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m also interested in processing trauma, and Jews have a long history of using humor to process trauma,\u201d she added. \u201cAnd I think this film does that pretty well.\u201d<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/10-11-2021-circ-illo-copy.jpg\")
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