6th Annual Cleveland Jewish FilmFest features 14 outstanding international feature and documentary films
Mandel JCC celebrates FilmFest from October 14-28
The Mandel Jewish Community Center’s sixth annual Leonard Krieger Cleveland Jewish FilmFest kicks off this fall with a tremendous lineup of international films and special events for all ages. The festival offers a broad selection of feature and documentary films with Jewish themes that will screen at local theaters and venues including Shaker and Cedar Lee Cinemas.
The FilmFest, which runs October 14-28, will showcase 14 top-notch films and special events.
Ticket Prices:
- Opening Night Film & Reception: $15
- Evening Films $10
- Matinee Films $8
- Special Price for David: $6
- Shalom Sesame: FREE with advance registration, or $10 per family at the door
Order your Tickets Today:
- Mandel JCC Membership Service Desk (No handling fees, No ticket sales on Saturdays)
- (800) 838-3006 (handling fee will be added)
- Purchase tickets online (Handling fee will be added)
- At theater on day of show. Tickets will go on sale 45 minutes before each show, if available. Ticket holders who arrive late are not guaranteed seating.
- Check the FilmFest website (www.mandeljcc.org/filmfest) for information about group tickets and passes.
- Questions? Want more information? Contact filmfest@mandeljcc.org
More information about this year’s film festival is available at www.mandeljcc.org/filmfest or by calling (216) 831-0700 ext. 1378.
The Leonard Krieger Cleveland Jewish FilmFest will feature the following films:
- “Portrait of Wally” (2012, USA/Austria, English, 90 min., Mature content.)
- 1:30 p.m. Sunday, Oct. 14, Cleveland Museum of Art Gartner Auditorium, 11150 East Blvd., Cleveland.
- Tickets to this film are only available through CMA: (216) 421-7350 or (888) CMA-0033 or Click here
Egon Schiele’s 1912 portrait of his mistress is at the center of this new documentary, which premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival, about a 13-year legal battle between some of the most well-known museums in New York and Europe and the Jewish family that argued the painting was stolen from them by the Nazis.
Sponsor: Sally & Larry Sears
- “My Best Enemy” (2011, Austria/Luxembourg, German with subtitles, 109 min.)
- 7 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 18, Shaker Square Cinemas, 13116 Shaker Square, Cleveland.
My Best Enemy, featured at the Berlin Film Festival, is the story of Victor, the son of wealthy Jewish gallery owners in Vienna, and Rudi, the son of Victor’s family’s housekeeper. Friends since childhood, the young men’s relationship changes when the Nazis invade Austria and Rudi enlists, betraying the family that once thought of him as one of their own. A secret Michelangelo drawing is the answer to both the Kaufmann family’s survival and Rudi’s rise in the Nazi hierarchy in this gripping thriller.
Sponsor: Heather & Irwin Lowenstein and the Ronald & Helen Ross Family Philanthropic Fund of the Jewish Federation
- “Follow Me: The Yoni Netanyahu Story” (2011, USA, English, Hebrew, 83 min.)
- 2 p.m. Friday, Oct. 19, Cedar Lee Theatre, 2163 Lee Road, Cleveland Heights.
On July 4, 1976, 30-year-old Lieutenant Colonel Yoni Netanyahu led the famed mission that rescued 103 Israeli hostages from Palestinian terrorists at the Entebbe Airport in Uganda. Follow Me uses interviews and Yoni’s poignant letters and writings to show him as a reluctant soldier whose love for his country led him away from academia to die a hero in Israel’s most prestigious army unit.
- “Remembrance” (2011, Germany, English, German and Polish with subtitles, 105 min.)
- 8 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 20, Cedar Lee Theatre
- 2 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 24, Cedar Lee Theatre
Inspired by true events, Remembrance is a tense and moving love story involving a Polish partisan and German Jewish woman battling the terror of a German concentration camp in Poland. After a daring escape, the chaos of war forcibly separates Tomasz and Hannah, each believing the other has died. More than 30 years later Hannah, a happily married mother, sees Tomasz on television and vows to find her lost love.
Sponsor: David & Inez Myers Foundation
- “Bottle in the Gaza Sea” (2011, France/Canada/Israel, French, Hebrew, English, 99 min.)
- 7 p.m. Sunday, Oct. 21, Cedar Lee Theatre
After witnessing a terrorist attack at her local café, Tal, an Israeli teenager originally from France, seeks understanding of Arab/Israeli violence. Hoping for a response, she slips a message of peace in a bottle that she asks her brother to throw into the sea while he is on patrol near Gaza. Eventually, Tal receives an email response from NaÏm, a teenaged Palestinian who calls himself “Gazaman.” Through their email correspondence, the two develop a virtual friendship. Based on the novel by Valérie Zenatti.
- “Kaddish for a Friend” (2010, Germany, Arabic, German, and Russian with subtitles, 94 min.)
- 6 p.m. Monday, Oct. 22, The Temple Tifereth Israel, 26000 Shaker Blvd., Beachwood (Special Teen Screen for teens only)
- 7:30 p.m. Monday, Oct. 22, Cedar Lee Theatre
Growing up in a Palestinian refugee camp, 14-year-old Ali learned to hate Jews at an early age. When he and his family immigrate to Berlin after escaping Lebanon, Ali attempts to fit in with his Arab peers by vandalizing the apartment of the elderly Russian Jew who lives upstairs. Threatened with deportation, he is forced to help repair the damage. Based on actual events, the film is a heartwarming of an unlikely friendship.
- “Free Men” (2011, France, French with subtitles, 99 min.)
- 4 p.m. Tuesday, Oct. 23, Cedar Lee Theatre
- 9 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 27, Solon Cinemas, 6185 Enterprise Parkway, Solon
A young Algerian immigrant, making a living by dealing black-market goods, is arrested and then recruited to spy on a mosque suspected of hiding Jews and issuing false identification documents. There he befriends an Algerian cabaret singer whom he later discovers is a Jew. Free Men, based on actual events, portrays the transformation of an apolitical Algerian immigrant into a full-fledged freedom fighter.
Sponsor: Sally & Larry Sears
- “The Flat” (2011, Israel, Hebrew, English, and German, 97 min.)
- 7:30 p.m. Tuesday, Oct. 23, Cedar Lee Theatre
Premiered at Tribeca, The Flat depicts the ramifications of the emptying of an Israel apartment after the family matriarch dies. It is a story of unexpected alliances and deeply repressed family emotions.
Sponsor: Erica Hartman-Horvitz & Richard Horvitz
- “AKA Doc Pomus” (2012, USA, English, 98min.)
- 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 24, Cedar Lee Theatre
This musically rich biography pays homage to Doc Pomus, the legendary Brill Building songwriter who authored such enduring rock-and-roll hits as “Save the Last Dance for Me,” “Teenager in Love,” “Viva Las Vegas” and dozens of others for talents as diverse as Dion, Elvis Presley, Dr. John and B.B. King. Doc Pomus, born Jerome Felder, was a city-bred Jew who spent a lifetime overcoming both visible and private pain through his extraordinary songs. In this spirited documentary, he is revealed as an American original.
- “The Last Flight of Petr Ginz” (2012, USA, English, 66 min.)
- 4 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 25, Cedar Lee Theatre
Little was known about child prodigy Petr Ginz until the Israeli astronaut Ilan Ramon carried his drawing of a lunar landscape aboard the ill-fated Columbia space shuttle mission. Ginz completed 5 novels, numerous short stories, and a diary about the Nazi occupation of Prague—all before he was killed at age 16. He was an artist who left behind 120 drawings and paintings. The filmmakers bring his art to life in a collage of animation, archival footage and interviews.
- “The Day I Saw Your Heart” (2011, France, French with subtitles, 98 min.)
- 7:30 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 25, Cedar Lee Theatre
When Eli’s two grown daughters, Dom, who is trying to adopt, and Justine, who flies from one boyfriend to the next, find out that he is expecting a baby with his new wife, they are indignant. The film particularly follows Justine’s attempt to deal with the pregnancy and her difficult journey to reconciliation. Accompanied by a lively soundtrack, the film is a heartwarming comedy-melodrama with eccentric, lovable characters.
- “Shalom Sesame: Mitzvah on the Street” (English, 33 min.)
- 9:30-11 a.m. Sunday, Oct. 28, Mandel JCC, 26001 S. Woodland Road, Beachwood
A special event for preschoolers and their families including Shalom Sesame, crafts, activities, snacks and more. Everyone lends a helping hand after a storm makes a mess of the neighborhood. In the meantime, Matisyahu and Oofnik have a blast beat-boxing Hava Nagila. Come celebrate a Bar Mitzvah with Grover in Jerusalem!
Sponsor: PJ Library© and Jewish Federation of Cleveland
- “David” (2011, USA, English, 80 min.)
- 2 p.m. Sunday, Oct. 28, Mandel JCC
Daud, the son of the local Brooklyn imam, is a lonely 11-year-old boy juggling the high expectations of his father and his feelings of isolation. One day, through an innocent act of good faith, Daud is mistaken for a yeshiva student and befriended by a group of Jewish boys. Unable to resist his newfound camaraderie and freedom, Daud becomes David in this family-friendly drama.
Sponsor: Heather & Irwin Lowenstein and the Ronald & Helen Ross Family Philanthropic Fund of the Jewish Federation
- “Orchestra of Exiles” (2012, USA, English, 2012, 82 min.)
- 7 p.m. Sunday, Oct. 28, Shaker Square Cinemas
The compelling story of one man’s vision and the struggles of Jewish musicians against Nazism is the focus of this new documentary. Interviews with Pinchas Zukerman, Yitzhak Pearlman, Joshua Bell and Zubin Mehta animate the story of the creation of the Israel Philharmonic and its remarkable founder, Bronislaw Huberman.
