Jewish Film Festival in Pleasantville Screens New Films and Documentaries, Fan Favorites
Jacob Burns Film Center’s 2023 Jewish Film Festival begins May 17 with seven new films and documentaries in addition to three previous fan favorites—A Fish in the Bathtub, Bombshell: The Hedy Lamarr Story, and iMordecai—through May 25.
Festival curator Bruni Burres said this festival—and the center’s other festivals—highlight the need for curation in a media landscape that is saturated with choices.
“When we go to a platform like Amazon Prime and we’re looking for something, we don’t know what we’re looking for,” said Burres. “Whereas if you have a trusted community cinema or art house with curators you respect and trust…it can be a better way to find the films you want to see.”
The festival launches with a screening of the award-winning 2022 film SHTTL, a Yiddish-language drama about life in a Jewish village near the Polish border shortly before Germany’s invasion of Soviet Ukraine. She called SHTTL an unusual piece of art. “Shtetl” is a Yiddish word describing the small towns of Jewish communities in Eastern Europe during the 19th and 20th centuries.
“[In the film,] you feel the life—and what shtetl life was—in a way that’s rarely represented in books or other cinema that I’ve seen,” said Burres.
The screening will be followed by a question-and-answer session with cast members, one of seven such sessions throughout the festival. Burres said the post-screening discussions are community events that keep film festivals relevant in the age of at-home streaming media.
“There is the questioning of the story, where the story came from, and how they began to think about making a film about these topics,” said Burres. “[For instance, filmmaker] Julia Mintz of Four Winters has an extraordinary story to share with the audience about the WWII Jewish partisans.”
Other new films being screened include Our Almost Completely True Story, a romantic comedy about love and dating beyond “middle age”; March 68, about two students who fall in love in the midst of social turmoil in 1960s Warsaw; as well as America, Let It Be Morning, and a restored version of The Garden of the Finzi-Continis. In addition, the television series The Conductor, the story of world-renowned musician and orchestra conductor Noah Gamliel, will be screened in two parts.
The festival’s attendees will be among the first patrons to experience the film center’s newly renovated ground-floor theaters. In addition to new plush seats and increased legroom in theaters 2 and 3, Burres says the new on-stage lighting in theater 2 will enhance audience interaction with special guests during question-and-answer sessions.
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Founded in 1965, ArtsWestchester is New York State’s largest private not-for-profit arts council. The leading funder and advocate for the arts in Westchester and Rockland Counties, ArtsWestchester works to create an equitable, inclusive, vibrant and sustainable community in which the arts are integral to and integrated into every facet of life. Building on its 60-year legacy, ArtsWestchester advances arts and culture by providing grants, bringing artists into schools and community centers, advocating for the arts, and building audiences through diverse marketing initiatives. ArtsWestchester enriches the lives of everyone in the community and operates a multi-use gallery and home for the arts at 31 Mamaroneck Ave. in White Plains, New York.
