Anniversary Jewish Film Festival to be held in New York

Фото: Depositphotos

Jubilee, twenty-fifth, Jewish Film Festival, whose program 38 films from 12 countries, will be held in New York from 13 to January 26.

It will feature both full-length and short films, writes “Voice of America".

21 from 38 films will receive world, American or New York premieres at the Festival.

“This year we are showing a film from Ethiopia for the first time, and we are showing it at the grand opening. We are very proud of our choice as it is a delicate and distinctive work,” said festival executive director Aviva Weintraub.

This film will be “The Lamb” directed by Yared Zeleke, shot in Amharic language with the participation of France, Germany and Norway. He tells the story of a young Ephraim, who, after the death of his mother, his father sends to distant relatives. When Uncle Ephraim decides to slaughter his beloved lamb on a religious holiday, the boy does everything to prevent the sacrifice. "Lamb" - the first film from Ethiopia, shown at the Cannes Film Festival and included in the list of foreign tapes presented at the Oscar.

“This year is special for us, an anniversary. In this regard, we have prepared several special, so to speak, “side” programs. In particular, we are showing nine of the most successful films from previous years’ programs,” said Aviva Weintraub.

One of them, “Benya Krik”, is a silent 1926 film of the year, directed by Vladimir Vilner, which was shot at the Odessa studio VUFKU based on “Odessa Tales” by Isaac Babel.

The festival will feature films shot in Ukraine. One of them is the romantic fantasy drama “Song of Songs” directed by Eva Neumann, which is based on the lyrical work of the Jewish writer Sholom Aleichem. The main characters, lovers Shimek and Buzya, live at the beginning of the 20th century in a poor Jewish town and, at the same time, in a world of sweet dreams, where he is a prince and she is a princess.

“Our festival does not exist in a closed space. We know that Jewish cinema is undergoing major changes in our globalized world. If in the first years of the festival we focused on films from the former Soviet Union and Eastern European countries, then later we expanded the selection to include Israel, Western Europe, North and South America in our orbit. Over these 25 years, we have shown about seven hundred films from 43 countries. Almost all films are presented by their creators, and after the screenings they answer questions from the audience,” summed up the festival’s executive director.

As the “Forum” wrote, from October 10 to November 8 in the Silicon Valley Jewish Film Festival took place.