Cuba’s Forgotten Jewels: A Haven in Havana

DOCUMENTARY USA
Explore the little known story of the Jewish refugees who escaped Nazi-occupied Europe and found a safe haven on the Caribbean island of Cuba, including hundreds of Jewish diamond cutters who, for a few years, turned the small tropical island into one of the world’s major diamond-polishing centers. The film recalls the refugees' lives in wartime Havana: the draw of Cuban food, music and dance, its language and people, and also the challenges they faced in this unfamiliar land. Shot on location in Cuba, the film’s original score combines Cuban and Jewish music. More

Carvalho's Journey

DOCUMENTARY USA
A real life 19th-century American western adventure story, Carvalho's Journey tells the extraordinary story of Solomon Nunes Carvalho (1815-1897), an observant Sephardic Jew born in Charleston, South Carolina, and his life as a groundbreaking explorer and artist. The film interweaves stunning HD digital and 16mm film landscape cinematography, rare 19th century photographs and artwork, Carvalho’s own surviving paintings and daguerreotypes, and interviews with scholars and artists, including modern day daguerreotypist Robert Shlaer who recreates Carvalho’s original daguerreotypes on location. Narrated by Award winning actor Michael Stuhlbarg (Boardwalk Empire, Hugo, A Serious Man). More

Rosenwald

DOCUMENTARY USA
Julius Rosenwald, the son of an immigrant peddler who never finished high school, rose to become the President of Sears. Influenced by the writings of the educator Booker T. Washington, this Jewish philanthropist joined forces with African American communities during the Jim Crow South to build 5,300 schools in the segregated American South. See this important new documentary from filmmaker Aviva Kempner. More

Theodore Bikel: In the Shoes of Sholom Aleichem

DOCUMENTARY USA
The stories of two beloved Jewish icons are woven together in this enchanting documentary: Sholom Aleichem, the great Jewish storyteller and Theodore Bikel- troubadour, actor and the most popular interpreter of Aleichem’s work. Based on Bikel’s acclaimed stage play “Sholom Aleichem: Laughter Through Tears." The two men have much in common-- wisdom, humor, humanity, massive talent, and a gift for Yiddish. More

Mamele (1938, Yiddish with English subtitles, 97 minutes)

NEWEST NCJF FILM RESTORATION POLAND
Mamele belongs to Molly Picon, “Queen of the Yiddish Musical,” who shines as mamele (little mother), the dutiful daughter keeping her family intact after the death of their mother. She's so busy cooking, cleaning, and matchmaking for her brothers and sisters that she has little time for herself, until she discovers the violinist across the courtyard!

Set in Lodz, this musical comedy drama, which features Picon's trademark song Abi Gezunt, embraces the diverse gamut of interwar Jewish life in Poland, with its nogoodniks and unemployed, nightclubs and gangsters, and religious Jews celebrating Succoth.

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American Jerusalem:
Jews and the Making of San Francisco

DOCUMENTARY USA
American Jerusalem: Jews and the Making of San Francisco tells the remarkable story of the pioneering Jews of San Francisco. Drawn to California by the Gold Rush, Jews were welcomed in San Francisco. They went on to build a thriving community, the second largest Jewish community in the United States after New York. With a newfound freedom, Jews played a central role in the transformation of this once-sleepy maritime village into the largest metropolis in the American West. As Jews integrated into mainstream San Francisco society, they reinvented what it meant for them to be Jewish. Their creation was a new kind of Jew – a San Francisco Jew. More

The Trial of Adolf Eichmann

DOCUMENTARY FRANCE
A New Film from the producers of Being Jewish in France and Einsatzgruppen
The 1961 trial of Adolf Eichmann held in an Israeli courtroom and broadcast around the globe, was a benchmark event in the historiography of the Holocaust and a milestone in media and journalism coverage. This compelling new documentary features accounts of Eichmann's capture, the drama in the courtroom and behind the scenes, and reactions from around the world. More

A Child of the Ghetto (1910, Silent, 15 minutes)

NCJF NEW DIGITAL RESTORATION RARE FILM USA
New musical score by Alexander Freudenthal & Hans Nyman
This short tale of Lower East Side life captures the hustle and bustle of Rivington Street through the lens of legendary Hollywood director D.W. Griffith. After the death of her mother, Ruth struggles to support herself as a seamstress. As she delivers her bundle of shirts to the factory owner, the owner's son steals some money and Ruth is accused of the crime. She then flees the ghetto and hides in the country where a young farmer takes her in and they fall in love. More

Cohen on the Telephone (1929, Early Sound, 9 minutes)

NCJF NEW DIGITAL RESTORATION VAUDEVILLE SHORT USA
With the advent of sound, the vaudeville-immigrant genre added comic speech to its repertoire of physical comedy and funny situations. Here, the Jewish immigrant, compassionately played by George Sidney, is characterized not simply by how he moves and looks, but by how he speaks. From his office, Cohen telephones his landlord to ask him to fix a window that was blown out by a storm. Unfamiliar with the telephone and still uncomfortable with the English language, Cohen embroils himself in a comic monologue of misunderstanding. More

Ahead of Time

DOCUMENTARY USA
For seven decades foreign correspondent and photojournalist Ruth Gruber didn’t just report the news…she made it! Born in 1911 to Russian Jewish immigrants, Gruber reported from the Soviet Arctic, escorted Holocaust refugees on a secret war-time mission, and changed the world with dispatches from the Palestine-bound ship Exodus in 1947. More
WINNER— BEST DOCUMENTARY:
BERKSHIRE INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL, MIAMI JEWISH FILM FESTIVAL; DENVER JEWISH FILM FESTIVAL; PALM BEACH JEWISH FILM FESTIVAL

Clementine

DOCUMENTARY ISRAEL
A fascinating investigation that mirrors the development of Israel itself. Shaking his own family tree in this beautifully-crafted documentary, Tal Yoffe discovers a pioneering kibbutznik filmmaker, a Czarist army officer, a Nazi-trained blacksmith, several war heroes and a much missed father. More
HONORABLE MENTION — JERUSALEM FILM FESTIVAL 2009

The Green Dumpster Mystery

DOCUMENTARY ISRAEL
Traveling on his scooter through Tel Aviv, filmmaker Tal Haim Yoffe finds a discarded box of old photographs in a green dumpster. This docu-detective film, slowly unwinds a family history, beginning in Lodz, Poland, and traveling through the Siberian Gulag, a Samarkand sugar plant, a Ha’apala ship and the battlefields of the Sinai Peninsula. More
OFFICIAL SELECTION— ISRAEL FILM FESTIVAL, NEW YORK 2009

How to Re-Establish a Vodka Empire

DOCUMENTARY ENGLAND
When British filmmaker Edelstyn travels to the Ukraine in search of his Jewish roots and discovers that the vodka distillery opened by his great grandfather in 1904 is still in operation, he decides--despite his utter lack of business experience--to become a liquor entrepreneur.

"A barnstorming tale of vodka and revolution." --BBC Radio
"★★★★ Unfolds as a travelogue, a memoir, a historical recreation, and a detective story." --Irish Times
"★★★★ Think Jonathan Safran Foer's Everything is Illuminated but fuelled by vodka rather than heavy-handed pathos: it's Everything is Inebriated...Edelstyn is such an engaging traveling companion. Witty, a bit feckless and often half-cut, he would be the perfect dinner party guest - and he'd bring a bottle." --The Times (London) More

Jewish Soldiers in Blue and Gray

DOCUMENTARY USA
Produced In commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the Civil War, this exploration of the little-known history of the 10,000 Jewish soldiers who fought in the nation's deadliest war is the first documentary devoted to the subject. Allegiances during the War Between the States split the Jewish community as deeply as the national debate in the country at large: some prominent Jewish voices cited the Torah to justify slavery, while others led the abolitionist movement. More
FILM FESTIVAL FAVORITE

The Liquid of Life

DOCUMENTARY ISRAEL
Pini Schatz's funny and original film (subtitled How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Blood) proves there’s no reason to be afraid of the liquid that flows in our veins. Meet a cross section of unique Israeli characters including the director of Magen David Adom. And learn how to mix the perfect bloody mary. More
WINNER— BEST INT'L SHORT DOCUMENTARY, NY INDEPENDENT FILM & VIDEO FESTIVAL

Me and the Jewish Thing

DOCUMENTARY DENMARK
In this witty and thoughtful meditation on the collision of two cultures, Danish Jewish filmmaker Ulrik Gutkin and his Danish non-Jewish girlfriend find themselves on opposites sides in deciding whether to circumcise their new baby boy. What follows is Gutkin’s reconsideration what it means to be a Jew in Denmark. More
WINNER— BEST DOCUMENTARY, SAO PAULO JEWISH FILM FESTIVAL

Robert Jay Lifton: Nazi Doctors

DOCUMENTARY GERMANY
World renowned psychiatrist Robert Jay Lifton discusses the processes by which ordinary doctors became murders, issues at the heart of his groundbreaking 1986 book The Nazi Doctors: Medical Killing and the Psychology of Genocide. "This is a fascinating, compelling, profoundly disturbing movie that miraculously leaves one agreeing with Lifton that ‘there is room for hope.’” –Karen Cooper, Director, Film Forum More

US THEATRICAL PREMIERE @ FILM FORUM— NYC

2 or 3 Things I Know About Him

GROUND-BREAKING DOCUMENTARY GERMANY
Malte Ludin's documentary about his father, Hanns Ludin, a prominent Nazi who was tried and executed as a war criminal in 1947. More

Yizkor (Remembrance)

DOCUMENTARY SHORT USA
Winner of the 2010 Student Academy Award Gold Medal for Documentary, Ruth Fertig’s Yizkor (Remembrance) uses animation by Jeanne Stern, archival film, home movies and Super 8 footage to tell her grandmother’s story of survival and resilience in the face of crushing loss. More

WINNER— STUDENT ACADEMY AWARD, GOLD MEDAL- DOCUMENTARY
WINNER— CINE GOLDEN EAGLE AWARD, STUDENT DIVISION- DOCUMENTARY
SPECIAL MENTION— JEWISH WOMENS FILM FESTIVAL, NYC
WINNER— BEST STUDENT DOCUMENTARY, NASHVILLE JEWISH FILM FESTIVAL

The Axel Corti Collection

RE-RELEASE: FEATURE FILM CLASSICS AUSTRIA
God Does Not Believe in Us Anymore, Santa Fe, and Welcome in Vienna comprise a trilogy of films directed by Axel Corti and written by Georg Stefan Troller. The films are loosely based on Troller’s life as a Viennese Jew who fled Europe as a teenager, emigrated to the United States, and returned to Europe during World War II as an American soldier. More

Yoo-Hoo, Mrs. Goldberg

FILM FESTIVAL FAVORITE USA
Yoo Hoo, Mrs. Goldberg is the funny and surprising story of radio & television pioneer Gertrude Berg. Creator, star and writer (12,000 scripts!) of the hit sitcom The Goldbergs, Berg was a beloved trailblazer, the Oprah of her day. Berg’s blend of comedy and social commentary—with Jewish characters at the center—endeared audiences and made her an American cultural icon. From Aviva Kempner, director of Rosenwald, Partisans of Vilna and The Life and Times of Hank Greenberg. More

FILM FESTIVAL FAVORITE! BOOKED OVER $1.5 MILLION AT BOX OFFICE

Kol Nidre (1939, Yiddish with English subtitles, 88 minutes)

NCJF FILM RESTORATION USA
Long lost, Kol Nidre has been restored by The National Center for Jewish Film with 490 new English subtitles using the sole surviving 35mm nitrate print acquired from the family of director Joseph Seiden. Kol Nidre marks the on-screen reunion of Leon Liebgold and Lili Liliana, the husband and wife Warsaw actors famous for their roles as the young lovers in 1937's The Dybbuk. Also featured are the comedienne Yetta Zwerling, Motl the Operator star Chaim Tauber, and popular entertainer and cantor Leibele Waldman. More

Breaking Home Ties (1922, Silent, 78 minutes)

NORTH AMERICAN PREMIERE: NY JEWISH FILM FESTIVAL, LINCOLN CENTER FEATURE FILM USA
Thinking he has killed his friend Paul in a jealous rage, David Bergmann flees St. Petersburg for New York, where he becomes a successful lawyer and woos smart independent Rose. When the Bergmann parents emigrate to New York, immigrant life takes its toll and they fall into poverty. Will David marry Rose? Will the Bergmanns be reunited? This drama was produced to counter the escalating anti-semitism of the Ku Klux Klan and Henry Ford in 1920s America. Long thought lost, the world’s only existing print of Breaking Home Ties was discovered and restored by The National Center for Jewish Film. More
NEW NCJF FILM RESTORATION!

Singing in the Dark (1956, 86 minutes)

NEW NCJF RESTORATION FEATURE FILM USA
A quirky combination of 1950s movie conventions—the musical, gangster and mystery movie—this virtually unknown independent film is one of the first American features to dramatize the Holocaust. Starring Moishe Oysher as a survivor suffering from traumatic amnesia who becomes a singing sensation. More
MOISHE OYSHER IN ENGLISH!

Bar Mitzvah (1935, Yiddish with new English subtitles, 75 min)

NEW NCJF RESTORATION USA YIDDISH FILM NEW SUBTITLES
A shund sensation starring Boris Thomashefsky in his only film performance! "Lightning bolts of cinematic revelation," -The New Yorker More

The Jester Der Purimspiler
(1937, Yiddish with new English subtitles, 90 min)

35MM RESTORATION NEW SUBTITLES POLAND
The Jester's lively circus and vaudeville music and set pieces provide a glimpse of Warsaw's then-thriving Yiddish revues and cabarets, which were destroyed soon after. More

His Wife's Lover Zayn Vaybs Lubovnik
(1931, Yiddish with new English subtitles, 80 min)

35MM RESTORATION NEW SUBTITLES USA
Billed as the "first Jewish musical comedy talking picture," His Wife’s Lover stars the popular comedian of the Yiddish theatre Ludwig Satz. This fast-paced comedy revels in its role reversals and love triangles. More

The Cantor's Son Dem Khazns Zundyl
(1937, Yiddish with new English subtitles, 90 min)

35MM RESTORATION NEW SUBTITLES USA
This toe-tapping Yiddish musical drama marks the screen debut of Moishe Oysher in the title role critic J. Hoberman calls the “anti-Jazz Singer.” Leaving behind his Shtetle Belz for New York's Lower East Side, Sol eventually lands the American dream, becoming a popular singer and radio star. More

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