Jewish Film Festival

 Jewish Cinema: Culture, Community, Conversation

The Jewish Film Festival is a hallmark event that runs throughout the calendar and brings exciting, entertaining, and thought-provoking film to our community along with a discussion led by an area expert.

Individual films: $13, $7 JCC Member discount ($13.39, $7.21 when paying with a credit card) 

Please Note: Most films are intended for  an adult audience

For more information, please call Judy Ben-Ami at (518) 377-8803 or email judyb@schenectadyjcc.org

 

UPCOMING FILM

IRENA'S VOW

 

Saturday, January 25, 7:30 PM

 

Discussion Leader: Rabbi Amiel Monson

 

This program is cohosted by Congregation Beth Shalom

 

2023, 121 min., Canada-Poland, English

In occupied Poland, a former nurse risks her own life to shelter a dozen Jewish men and women from the Nazi war machine in this unforgettable tale of bravery and sacrifice. Set in 1939, when the Nazis invade Poland, nurse Irena Gut is displaced and forced to work in support of the German war effort, running the home of a Nazi commandant. Instead of following the path of least resistance and gambling on her status and ethnicity to keep her safe, she risks everything to save a dozen Jewish refugees from murder, sheltering them under her boss’s nose. Irena’s Vow is, at its heart, a story of simple moral clarity in which, the empathetic Sophie Nélisse is forced, over and over again, to negotiate an impossible situation to ensure not just  her friends’ survival, but her own. Director: Louise Archambault 

BUY TICKETS HERE or AT THE DOOR

 

 

 NEXT FILM:

ALL ABOUT THE LEVKOVICHES

 

Saturday, February 15, 7:30 PM

 

Discussion Leaders: Peter & BJ Rosenfeld, Ed & Andrea Leighton

 

2023, 85 min., Hungary, Hungarian & Hebrew with English subtitles

In this heartwarming family comedy, an elderly boxing coach, known for his generosity but stubbornness, finds it easy to   connect with everyone except his own son. Their strained   relationship has resulted in years of silence, to the point where the old man has never even met his grandson, who moved to Israel with his father and adopted an Orthodox Jewish lifestyle. However, when the old man's wife unexpectedly passes away, the family is brought back together for her funeral. As they sit shiva and mourn for a week, they embark on a journey of rediscovery, healing, and understanding. Director: Ádám Breier

 

AUCTION

Saturday, March 8 , 7:30 PM

Discussion Leader: Kayla Carlsen, Executive Director of the Albany Institute of History and Art 

 

2024, 91 Min., France, French with English subtitles
Based on true events, hotshot opportunist wheeler-art dealer André Masson receives a letter concerning the discovery of a painting in a factory worker’s home in the suburbs on the Alsatian border. Said painting, by Austrian expressionist Egon Schiele, had been long assumed lost, condemned and destroyed as “degenerate art” by the Nazis in 1939. Masson’s first reaction is to believe that it can only be a copy. He decides to make the trip to examine it, and, against all odds, the painting turns out to be the masterpiece that has gone missing. This could undoubtedly be the turning point of his career, but after a brief investigation, he realizes that he has in his hands a looted work of art. Director: Pascal Bonitzer

 

 

 

REVENGE: OUR DADTHE NAZI KILLER

Sunday, April 27, 7:00 PM

Discussion Leader: Professor Stephen Berk

 

2023,101 min., Australia, English

This documentary follows three Jewish brothers in Melbourne who stumble on a family secret: their father, a Holocaust           survivor and WWII partisan, allegedly went to Sydney in the 1950s to undertake a revenge killing against a Nazi. As they delve into the past, they unexpectedly unearth a web of Nazi networks Down Under, covert Jewish vigilante groups, and multiple cases of Nazis who mysteriously died or disappeared in post-WWII Australia. All of this occurs in the context of Cold War intrigue, with antisemitism at the highest level of government. A gripping story that poses the moral question of when, if ever, is it justified to take the law into your own hands? Director: Danny Ben-Moshe