Esther Field

Mothers of Today features the first motion picture performance of radio star Esther Field, best known on the airwaves of the 1930s as the 'Yiddishe Mama.' The film exemplifies the Yiddish film genre of shund, a brand of popular entertainment which appealed to working-class Jewish-American immigrant audiences with broadly-drawn, sentimental stories that reflected the daily life and culture of a distinctively American Yiddish community. While the shund films were invariably low-budget (and low-brow) affairs, these humble productions formed an important part of life in the United States for their audience.

Mendel and Hannah Shapiro, an elderly Jewish couple who run a small farm in New Jersey, must get money to meet their mortgage payment to the bank by the next day to keep their farm. Mendel calls their children, Mollie, in Philadelphia, and Morris, in New York, to come right away. His neighbor Michel believes that most children do not properly care for their parents and insinuates that Mendel's children would not come to visit if they knew that their parents needed money. Mendel, however, assures Michel that children are the best investment one can make.