Land of Israel Committee presents

 

Mini

Israeli-Film Festival

Monday, January 19, 2004

Boston Jewish-Russian Center

29 Chestnut Hill Ave, Brighton, MA

 

Come and watch several award winning Israeli films made by the young filmmakers from the Ma’ale school of Film in Jerusalem. All films are in Hebrew with English subtitles. Please, feel free to come for the whole screening or just a part of it.

 

 

7:00 pm            

Introduction by Gilad Goldschmidt from the Ma’ale school of film

 

7:15 pm         

Like a Dream that Fades (2003, documentary, 30 min)

The story of Hillel Lieberman and Kever Yosef

 

7:45 pm         

Hallel (2001, fiction, 22 min)

Yael Klein, a religious married women overcomes her

marital problems and discovers a world of poetry, hitherto

unknown to her.

 

8:15 pm         

Intermission / questions and answers with Gilad

 

8:30 pm         

Evacuation order (2001, fiction - comedy, 13 min)

A group of IDF soldiers is dispatched to evacuate

an “Illegal Jewish settlement”. When its sole

settler turns out to be a beautiful young woman,

events take an unexpected turn.

8:45 pm         

The Orthodox Way (2003, fiction, 25 min)

A romantic comedy about dating the orthodox way

 

Admission is free, but a $10 donation is greatly appreciated.

All proceeds go to scholarship fund of the Ma’ale School of Film.

Brief Film descriptions:

 

Like a Dream that Fades

 

Israel ‏‏‏2003

Scriptwriter, Producer and Director:                  Yochai Rosenberg

Camera:                                                           Avishag Elbaz

Editing:                                                             Moriya Harel

Two days before Yom Kippur 2000, Hillel Lieberman left his home on a pilgrimage to Joseph's Tomb, which had been taken over by Arab rioters and abandoned by the IDF.  Wrapped in a prayer shawl, and without food or weapons, he marched to his certain death. 

The director examines the borderline between faith and obsession, alongside the question of when we choose to die, rather than live, for the things we love. (Documentary, 30 minutes)

 

Ido

Israel, 1998

Director, Producer and Editor:              Gilad Goldschmidt

Camera:                                               Noam Damasky, Gil Mezuman

Original Music:                                                 Diewelt” band

The charismatic leader of a punk rock band, 20-years-old Ido is a talented musician, an outspoken teenager, and suddenly, devoutly religious. Moving to the community of Beitar, he immerses himself in Torah, biblical Jewish study, while his family and friends grapple with his dramatic transformation. Following Ido for a year, the film vividly explores his inner growth- and reactions of those he left behind in the secular world. (Documentary, 29 minutes)

 

Changes

Israel ‏‏2003

Scriptwriter, Producer and Director:                  Avishag Elbaz

Camera:                                                           Avishag Elbaz

Additional Camera:                                           Yochai Rosenberg

                                                                        Aurital Maisel-Bitton

Editor:                                                              Ayelet Giladi-Bitan

Life has changed beyond recognition for Aviva and Avram Herzlich after the murder of their daughter, Talia, and her husband Binyamin Ze'ev Kahana.  They have left their beautiful home in the North and moved to the territories to bring up their grandchildren.  A vicious legal battle looms, even as Aviva and Avram must come to terms separately with their loss.

 

The Orthodox Way

Israel ‏‏2003                    

Scriptwriter and Director:    Ilan Eshkoli

Producer:                                            Ayelet Giladi-Bitan

Camera:                                              Moshe Churi

Editor:                                                 Ilan Eshkoli

Original Music:                                    Dudush Kalmas

Cast:                                                   Ronen Yifrach, Shelly Feldman.

              Eli, a single religious guy, is forced to go out on a blind date.  He picks up the wrong girl, and the two of them spend a bizarre evening driving around the streets of Jerusalem. A romantic comedy about dating the orthodox way. (Fictional, 25 minutes)

 

Hallel

Israel 2001, Fiction 22 min

              After being involved in a car accident, Yael Klein, a religious married woman meets a secular man, the owner of the bookshop. Against the background of the unsuccessful fertility treatments and marital frictions that the Kleins are experiencing, an unusual new relationship blossoms, and Yael discovers a world of books and poetry, hitherto unknown to her. Her caring but helpless husband is left behind. A dramatic event forces Yael to make a choice between them. 

 

Evacuation Order

Israel, 2001, Fiction 13 min

              On a little mountain in the West Bank a beautiful young woman lives all by herself. A couple of soldiers are sent to evacuate her from her home but one of them falls unexpectedly in love with her and complicates the whole operation.

 

About the Ma’ale films school

 

The Maale School of Television, Film and the Arts, founded in 1989, is a center of television and cinema studies above the college level.

It has opened the floodgates for a completely new kind of creativity in the world of cinema and television, in a religious community, which has not, historically, ever associated itself with the medium. Ma’ale is unique in the Jewish world in the way it is adapted to the central challenges of our generation: production conveyed by communications, television, and film that keep expanding and progressing from the Jewish cultural heritage and long to participate in media dialogue between the lay-men and religious sector.

Ma’ale is an institution for Torah and creative endeavor, where rabbis and religious scholars, together with directors and filmmakers, study halakhic and ethical issues encountered by filmmakers. The aim is to connect the visuals arts world to the world of Torah, and the application of halakha to new situations in Israel. In doing so it has brought an unusual and authentic new voice to the multi-cultural mosaic which is Israeli society, and has presented unprecedented issues for cinematic debate.

The films are influenced by the dialog between religious and secular creators.

 

The curricula at Ma’ale are based on experience accumulated at the world’s leading institutions. They lead to success because they combine focused academic study with comprehensive experimental workshops, group study along with personal attention, and a nurturing environment coupled with intimate familiarity with the market and the field amidst a warm and constructive social climate.

More than a hundred and forty graduates have completed their studies at the school until now, and almost all of them have integrated successfully into the Israeli television industry and teaching of communications subjects throughout Israel. The films of the graduates are held in esteem and receive impressive professional recognition. Most of the films have been purchased for broadcasting on the various channels of Israel Television and have won excellence awards. The films, in translation, are also disseminated to many communities and film festivals around the world, adding a dimension to Israel-Diaspora relations. The films won many prizes in various festivals all over

the world.