OPENING NIGHT: Dorfman

Thursday, March 15
6 pm Opening Reception
7 pm Film with Q & A to follow
Location: Showplace ICON Theatre at the West End

Special guest Hollywood Dorfman screenwriter Wendy Kout!

This yet-to-be-released Hollywood film is the tale of an underappreciated young Jewish woman who desperately needs to reinvent her life. Single, mousey and plain, she lives at home caring for her widowed father (Elliott Gould) and works as an accountant at her brother’s agency where she serves as workhorse, confidante and scapegoat. Socially inept and ill at ease, she spends a large portion of her day thinking of love. When the opportunity arises to help the man of her dreams by taking care of his cat and just-moved-into loft in the newly revitalized “D-town” of Los Angeles she jumps at the chance. Dorfman begins a whirlwind adventure of new experiences and meeting intriguing people, including an artist (Haaz Sleiman, The Visitor), that sparks an unexpected personal transformation in a newly transformed city.

Directed by Bradley Leong I USA, 2011 I 97 minutes I English | Recommended for ages 16 and up

“Transformation is possible… even in Los Angeles.” — Wendy Kout
Winner Best Feature: Hollywood Film Festival and the Miami Jewish Film Festival

Fluchkes

Sunday, March 18 at 12 pm — This showing in memory of Howard B. & Ruth F. Brin

A group of colorful, energetic 72 to 82 year old women bravely confront the hardships and demands of the art of dance. Fluchkes (Yiddish for flabby arms) follows the creation process of the dance performance “Gila”. At the same time, these honest and conscious women openly share their personal experience and feelings of growing older. Presenting a unique personal view of old age, this documentary follows the group over the course of a year of rehearsals, hardships, failures and intrigues to achieve friendship, happiness, beauty and inspirational success.

Directed by Ofer Inov I Israel, 2011 I 54 minutes I Hebrew with English Subtitles | Recommended for all ages.

My Australia

Saturday, March 17 at 8 pm
Sunday, March 18 at 4 pm

Single mother Helina struggles to raise her sons in 1960’s Poland. After the fatherless boys join a neighborhood gang with a strong Neo Nazi orientation and are arrested for attacking Jewish youngsters, she decides to tell her streetwise boys the truth: she is a Jew who survived the Holocaust and raised them in the Catholic faith. Fearing the dangerous road the boys are going down, Helina decides to move them away from Poland. The youngest boy is told they are immigrating to Australia, the place of his dreams, when in truth they are immigrating to Israel. This touching family drama explores the struggles of finding one’s identity, while building a new life in a foreign land.

Directed by Ami Drozd I Israel-Poland, 2010 I 96 minutes I Hebrew & Polish with English Subtitles | Recommended for ages 14 and up (language)

Winner, Audience Award, 2011 Jerusalem Film Festival

Bride Flight

Wednesday, March 21 at 7 pm

This lavish romantic drama charts the lives of three women who escape the gloom of post-WWII Holland for what they hope will be a better life in New Zealand. Ada, the shy but sensual farm girl, Marjorie, who dreams of a big family, and Esther, a Holocaust survivor who aspires to be a fashion designer, become fast friends during the long flight taking them to their waiting husbands, who have already settled in Christchurch, NZ. During the long flight the women and a dashing young man become fast friends. Upon arrival, they part ways to start their new lives, but their paths continue to cross with chance meetings resulting in adultery, betrayal and near tragedy leading up to a reunion some fifty years later.

Directed by Ben Sombogaart I Netherlands 2011 I 130 Minutes I Dutch and English with English Subtitles | Recommended for ages 18 and up (content, nudity)

Palm Beach Jewish Film Festival: Audience Favorite Award

Crime After Crime

Thursday, March 22 at 7 pm

Please stay for a panel discussion following the screening
The evening will also include a panel discussion on domestic violence and abuse that will be co-chaired by Dr. Jeffrey Edleson of the University of MN who is an internationally recognized expert on domestic violence. Also serving on the panel will be Judge Pam Alexander, Dave Ellis from United Way and Betsy Sitkoff from JFCS.

This powerful documentary follows the course of Deborah Preagler’s dramatic legal battle. Imprisoned for over a quarter century due to her connection to the murder of a brutally abusive boyfriend, Debbie finds her only hope for freedom in an unlikely pair of rookie attorneys (one an Orthodox Jew) with no background in criminal law. Convinced that they can free Debbie in a matter of months, her attorneys soon discover corruption and politically driven resistance that extends the case for years. Their investigation ultimately attracts global attention, and takes on profound urgency when the case becomes a matter of life and death. This film tells an unforgettable story of a relentless quest for justice and the relentless drive of the human spirit.

Directed by Yoav Potash I USA, 2010 I 93 minutes I English | Recommended for ages 18 and up (content)

“Harrowing, moving and inspiring…” – The Washington Post
Freedom of Expression Award by the National Board of Review, Official Selection at the Sundance Film Festival, Audience Award at the Atlanta Jewish Film Festival

As Seen Through These Eyes

Sunday, March 25 at 12 pm

Special Guest: Fimmaker Hilary Helstein With Q&A to Follow

As Maya Angelou narrates this powerful documentary, she reveals the story of a brave group of people who fought Hitler with the only weapons they had: charcoal, pencil stubs, shreds of paper and memories etched in their minds. These artists took their fate into their own hands to make a compelling statement about the human spirit, while enduring unimaginable odds.

Hilary Helstein (Director/Producer/Writer) began her career in the world of humanitarian causes. With her work with Steven Spielberg’s Survivors of the Shoah Visual History Foundation, she directed and produced over 200 segments and interviewed many prominent Holocaust survivors, military liberators and rescuers; among them, Simon Wiesenthal, Nobel Prize recipient Walter Kohn, and renowned Rabbi Graudenz, part of the Sugihara rescue committee. In addition to filmmaking, Hilary has worked in another capacity in the cultural arts. In 2004, she curated an exhibition of paintings, Samuel Bak: Between Worlds on surrealist, Samuel Bak for the Finegood Gallery. Prior to that, Hilary co-curated the art exhibit, Memory and Meaning: the Holocaust Through the Eyes of the Artist, for the Jewish Federation’s Los Angeles Museum of the Holocaust. Hilary started her career in LA in film development for actor Tom Hanks.

Directed by Hilary Helstein I USA 2010 I 74 Minutes I English | Recommended for ages 12 and up

Best Documentary: Los Angeles Jewish Film Festival, Miami Jewish Film Festival, Winnipeg International Film Festival and Audience Favorite, Toronto Jewish Film Festival

My First Wedding

Saturday, March 24 at 8 pm - Elly & Mike Zweigbaum Night at the Movies
Sunday, March 25 at 2 pm

Jewish-born Adrián and Catholic-born Leonora have finally reached their wedding day! Instead of gracefully embracing matrimony, Adrián spends the hours leading up to the ceremony trying to postpone it, not because he’s got cold feet (or does he?), but because he’s clumsily lost both his and his bride-to-be’s sacred wedding rings. Disaster ensues in director Ariel Winograd’s winning comedy about the politics of the proverbial “Big Day.”

Directed by Ariel Winograd I Argentina 2011 I 102 Minutes I Spanish with English Subtitles | Recommended for ages 12 and up

Third Highest Grossing Film in Argentina Opening Weekend; Nominated for 4 Argentinian Academy Awards, 2011

Remembrance

Sunday, March 18 at 7 pm
Sunday, March 25 at 4 pm

Inspired by actual events, this drama depicts a remarkable love story that blossomed amidst the terror of a German concentration camp in Poland in 1944. In a daring escape, Tomasz a young Polish prisoner rescues his Jewish lover Hannah Silberstein but during the chaos at the end of the war they lose each other. Thirty years later, Hannah believes she has seen Tomasz, in an interview on TV. The now married Hannah begins a new search for the man she thought she lost at the end of WWII.

Directed by Anna Justice (Max Minsky and Me) I Germany, 2011 I 105 Minutes I German, Polish and English with English Subtitles | Recommended for ages 16 and up.

Winner, Audience Award, Berlin and Beyond Film Festival, San Francisco, 2011

Naomi

Sunday, March 25 at 7 pm

Based on Israeli playwright Edna Mayza’s best-selling novel, this award-winning psychological thriller tells the tale of a 58-year-old astrophysics professor who is obsessively in love with his young wife, Naomi. When he discovers that his deepest fears have come true, he is unable to control himself. This suspenseful drama is about guilt, love and unlimited devotion.

Directed by Eitan Zur I Israel-France, 2010 I 102 minutes I Hebrew with English Subtitles | Recommended for ages 18 and up (content)

Critics Weeks at Venice Film Festival 2010; Three nominations 2010 Israel Film Academy.

Dolphin Boy

Wednesday, March 28 at 7 pm Robert Badiner Night at the Movies

Please stay for a panel discussion following the screening
Panelist: Molly DePrekel is a psychologist in private practice both at the Midwest Center for Trauma and Emotional Healing and Hold Your Horses. She was the co-founder of Minnesota Linking Individuals Nature and Critters.

A violent attack and beating causes Arab teenager, Morad, to disconnect from humans and totally withdraw into himself. As a last resort before hospitalization in a mental institution, his devoted father takes him to be treated with dolphins in Eilat, Israel. Morad starts speaking again after months of silence, but he erases his past and refuses to go home to his awaiting mother. This documentary following Morad over the course of four years explores the havoc that human violence can wreak upon the human soul and the healing powers of nature and of love.

Directed by Dani Menkin and Yonatan Nir I Israel, 2010I 72 Minutes I Hebrew & Arabic with English Subtitles | Recommended for ages 14 and up

Winner Jury Mention Award at the Jerusalem Film Festival; Winner Jury Prize, Woodstock Film Festival, 2011

The Names of Love

Thursday, March 29 at 7 pm

Taking the old hippie slogan, “Make love not war” to heart, Baya Benmahmoud uses her feminine wiles to convert right-wing men to her left-wing political agenda – until she meets a Jewish middle-aged, middle-of-the road scientist named Arthur Martin. Bound by common tragic family histories (the Algerian War and Holocaust under Vichy), the improbable duo is drawn to each other. Amid the bubbly French amour, humorous lasciviousness and moments of sheer madness, filmmaker Michel Leclerc injects satirical riffs on such hot-button sociopolitical issues as Arab-Jewish relations, anti-Semitism, immigration, and racial and cultural identity.

Directed by Michel Leclerc I France, 2010 I 102 minutes I French with English Subtitles | Recommended for ages 18 and up (language/nudity/content).

“Inspired, insightful and hilarious” – Los Angeles Times
Official Selection 2010 Cannes Film Festival, Opening Night, International Critics Week; César Awards 2011, Best Actress and Best Original Screenplay

Torn

Sunday, March 18 at 2 pm
Sunday, April 1 at 12 pm

Can one be a Catholic priest and an Observant Jew at the same time? Twelve years after he was ordained as a Polish Catholic priest, Romuald Waszkinel discovers that he was born to Jewish parents, and that his name was Jacob Weksler. Torn between two identities, he is required to choose one. Unable to renounce either he is rejected by both Catholics and Jews. This documentary follows his amazing journey from conducting mass in Poland to life as an observant Jew in a kibbutz in Israel.

Directed by Ronit Kertsner I Israel, 2011 | 72 minutes I Polish, Hebrew & French with English Subtitles | Recommended for all ages

Nominated for Best Feature Length Documentary Film, Israeli Documentary Forum Awards 2011

Kaddish for a Friend

Saturday, March 31 at 8 pm
Sunday, April 1 at 2 pm

Fourteen-year-old Ali Messalam learned to hate Jews while growing up in a Palestinian refugee camp. After escaping Lebanon, he and his family arrive in Berlin-Kreuzberg, Germany. In an attempt to prove himself and fit in with fellow Arab youths, he is challenged to break into the neighboring apartment of an 84-year-old Jewish WWII veteran. Ali’s “friends” follow him into the apartment and wreak havoc. After being recognized, Ali must seek out closeness to his neighbor to avoid being sentenced and deported. This tragicomic drama delves into unexpected friendships, trust and the art of forgiveness.

Directed by Leo Khasin I Germany 2011 I 94 Minutes I German with English Subtitles | Recommended for ages 14 and up

CLOSING NIGHT: Mabul

Sunday, April 1 at 7 pm
with Post-Reception following!

Everything is complicated in Yoni’s life. Almost 13, smart but physically undeveloped, Yoni struggles daily to grow up before his Bar Mitzvah. His new classmates bully him at every chance and his parents barely say a word to each other. Yoni’s life and the foundation of his family are shaken further, when one week before the ceremony his 17 year-old autistic brother returns home after years in a institution.

Directed by Guy Nattiv (A Matter of Size, Strangers)I Canada, France, Germany, Israel 2011 I 97 min I Hebrew with English Subtitles | Recommended for ages 14 and up

Nominated for 6 Israeli Academy Awards and Winner of Best Supporting Actor; Haifa Film Festival: Best Feature Film, Best Cinematography and Best Young Actor
“This is one of the best Israeli films of the year.” - Screen Daily