Category: Culture/Tradition

The director of the Yiddish classic The Dybbuk is remembered as a Polish aristocrat, Hollywood producer, a rogue and liar, and an open homosexual. But who, really, was Michal Waszyński (born Moshe Waks), the son of a poor Ukrainian Jewish blacksmith, who died as Prince Michal Waszyński in Italy? Waszyński made 40 films with Sophia Loren, Anna Magnani, Orson Welles and other stars, but his most spectacular creation was his own life.

Presenting a modern take on the narrative of the Wandering Jew, The Prince and the Dybbuk asks whether it is ever possible to cut oneself off from one’s roots, and at what cost.

Winner Best Documentary on Cinema at the 2017 Venice Film Festival.

The extraordinary story of Fredy Hirsch, a charismatic gymnast and youth leader who provided care and dignity to over 600 Jewish children.

Born in Germany, Hirsch was 19 years old when the Nuremberg Laws were published, forcing him to flee to the Czech Republic. Soon deported to Auschwitz, Hirsch used his experience to entertain and comfort the children of the camp, and collaborated with members of the underground to plan a revolt that never came to pass. Combining survivor testimony, exquisite animation and archive, Dear Fredy explores the life and legacy of an unsung queer Jewish hero.

Studio 54 was the epicentre of 70s hedonism – a place that not only redefined the nightclub, but also came to symbolise an entire era. Its co-owners, Ian Schrager and Steve Rubell, two Jewish friends from Brooklyn, seemed to come out of nowhere to suddenly preside over a new kind of New York society. Now, 39 years after the velvet rope was first slung across the club’s hallowed threshold, this feature documentary tells the real story behind the greatest club of all time.

Four women with nothing in common find their lives profoundly altered by an encounter with a mysterious stranger. A collection of stories spanning the seasons, each episode introduces a woman ‘on the verge’: a career police officer unable to cope with the stress of work and her teenage daughter; a lesbian cellist ambivalent about raising a child with her partner; a mother who plans to tell her children she’s getting a divorce; and a businesswoman who goes home for her mother’s funeral and must institutionalise her mentally challenged sister. Impacting each of these fractured lives is Neta, a drifter struggling with his own personal crisis.

This sensitive and thought-provoking contemplation of femininity and parenthood won the Audience Award at the 2017 Jerusalem Film Festival.

Benny, an only child who lost her mother at birth, lives with her fundamentalist father in a Jewish settlement in East Jerusalem. As her father becomes more and more obsessed with a red heifer that he believes will bring the redemption, Benny drifts further away and into the arms of Yael, a young new woman in her life. She embarks on a personal journey that will shape her religious, political and sexual consciousness.

This sensitive and assured coming-of-age film won Best Israeli Film, Best Debut Film and Best Actress at the 2018 Jerusalem Film Festival.