'Nora's Will' is to succeed at suicide

They were married for years, and divorced for even more years. But somehow, Jose (Fernando Lujan) never quite moved on. Or at least moved away from his ex, Nora.

So on the day, just before Passover, when Nora carries out her 14th and final suicide attempt, Jose is there to discover the body. She planned it that way.

And he's up against it, trying to get their son home for the funeral, trying to arrange a ceremony and have the body buried, according to Jewish custom, and done before Passover puts all such ceremonies on lockdown. He'll have to convince a rabbi to preside, a cemetery to give her a decent place of rest. Suicides often rule that out.

She planned that, too. It was Nora's wish that the cynical, atheist Jose suffer like this. Nothing's going to be done over these five days that isn't according to Nora's Will.

A grin-and-giggle Mexican-Jewish funeral farce (and how often do you get to write that sentence?), "Nora's Will" is a comical battle of wills between Jose and his dead ex-wife.

A team of temple specialists comes to wash and prepare the body. The rabbi (Max Kerlow) insists that Jose observe Shemira, so that the body will not be left alone.

So Jose leaves the body alone. He goes to the kitchen and orders pizza - "with ham, bacon and sausage." In front of an apartment full of Orthodox Jews.

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No, Jose isn't having this. That would be letting Nora have her way. And he doesn't care whom he offends- Nora's devoted maid, her screwball sister, his son, not even the rabbi himself.

Lujan, a veteran leading man now at an age when character roles more suit him, carries the film with a droll, understated bemusement.

"Nora's Will" is a marvelous, low-key comedy of little acts of rebellion, a movie that reminds us that no matter the culture or religion, no one is ever at his very best when a loved one - even an ex-loved one - has died.