by NJJN Staff

March 12, 2009

The Ninth Annual New Jersey Jewish Film Festival, sponsored by JCC MetroWest, will run from March 19 through March 29. Tickets for each screening cost $12, $10 for seniors, and $8 for students. Tickets for the opening night (The Little Traitor) and closing night films — which include post-screening discussions with special guests and a dessert reception — cost $20, $18 for seniors, and students. Group sales are also available.

The movies will be shown at the Leon & Toby Cooperman JCC, Ross Family Campus, West Orange, and other venues.

Visit www.njjff.org to view the schedule or to order tickets. Advance tickets may also be purchased by calling 800-494-TIXS or 973-530-3444. For more information, contact Heather Sorkin at hsorkin@jccmetrowest.org.

The Lineup

Arab Labor*
(Israel, 2007. 30 minutes each. English subtitles.)

Amjad is a 35-year-old journalist for a Hebrew language newspaper. The intersection of his career, love life, and experience as an Arab citizen in Israeli society provides the backdrop for this hilarious comedy, the first Israeli prime time show to feature an Arab-Israeli family.

At Home in Utopia*
(USA, 2008. 57 minutes.)

A home of one’s own — that’s the American dream. But what happens when the dreamers are immigrants, factory workers, and Communists?

The Beetle*
(Israel, 2008. 70 minutes. English subtitles.)

Director Yishai Orian and his wife are expecting. Yishai’s wife wants him to scrap his 40-year-old Volkswagen for a safer family car. Reluctant to part with the Beetle, he embarks on a journey to trace the car’s history, visit its past owners, and come to terms with its powerful hold on him.

Blessed Is the Match: The Life and Death of Hannah Senesh*
(USA, 2008. 86 minutes.)

The first documentary about the World War II-era poet and diarist who became a paratrooper, resistance fighter, and modern-day Joan of Arc.

Circumcise Me: The Comedy of Yisrael Campbell*
(Israel, 2007. 44 minutes.)

Campbell draws on his life experiences — including his conversion to Orthodox Judaism and the Palestinian-Israeli conflict — to create his routines.

The Debt*
(Israel, 2007. 93 minutes. English subtitles.)

Forty years after the supposed capture of the fictional Nazi war criminal, two ex-Mossad agents are alerted that he may still be alive. Desperate to keep their mistake a secret, they head to the Ukraine to find him.

For My Father*
(Israel, 2008. 98 minutes. English subtitles.)

Tarek is a young Arab and former soccer star who has agreed to be a suicide bomber in Tel Aviv to clear his father’s reputation. When the bomb malfunctions, he must spend two days in a small Tel Aviv neighborhood where he begins to forge a friendship some of the locals.

Four Seasons Lodge
(USA, 2008. 101 minutes. English, Polish, Hebrew, and Yiddish, with English subtitles.)

A New York Times reporter and a cinematographer document the waning days of a Catskills bungalow colony that has served as a summer getaway for a group of Holocaust survivors for the past 30 years.

Hey, Hey. It’s Esther Blueburger*
(Australia, 2008. 103 minutes.)

Esther is tired of being the outcast in her private school, so she enlists the help of a “cool girl” from the local public school. Esther begins living a double life, pretending to be a Swedish exchange student at the public school while trying to hide her secret from her family.

The Little Traitor*
(Israel and USA. 89 minutes. Hebrew and English, with English subtitles.)

An unlikely friendship between an Israeli boy and a British soldier is the basis for this tale set in Palestine in 1947.

Max Minsky and Me*
(Germany, 2007. 94 minutes. English subtitles.)

Nelly Sue Edelmeister has a crush on Prince Edouard of Luxembourg. When the girls’ high school basketball team has a chance to compete there, Nelly has to find a way to get on the team.

Monster Among Us*
(USA, 2008. 87 minutes.)

Fueled by the powerful ideology of Muslim extremists, a new wave of European anti-Semitism is cropping up in countries traditionally imbued with Western values.

One Day You’ll Understand
(France, 2008. 90 minutes. English subtitles.)

As the 1987 trial of Klaus Barbie plays out on television, a French businessman finds himself increasingly obsessed with piecing together the truth about his family’s history.

The Secrets*
(Israel, 2007. 120 minutes. Hebrew, French, and English, with English subtitles.)

The daughter of an ultra-Orthodox rabbi finds herself at a crossroads when her mother dies and she is expected to immediately marry her father’s prodigy. She begs her father allow her one year to study at a women’s religious seminary in Safed, the birthplace of Kabala, to prepare herself for the sacrifices she will make as a wife.

Sharon*
(Israel, 2008. 90 minutes. English subtitles.)

This documentary explores why former Prime Minister Ariel Sharon decided to initiate Israel’s unilateral pullout and evacuation of over 8,000 settlers from the Gaza Strip in 2005.

Strangers*
(Israel, 2008. 81 minutes. English, French, Hebrew, and Arabic, with English subtitles.)

Strangers offers the unlikely yet touching love story of an Israeli man and a Palestinian woman who meet by chance in Berlin at the World Cup finals in 2006 against the backdrop of the Second Lebanon war.

A Trip To Prague
(USA, 2007. Four minutes.)

Using simple narration and the filmmaker’s own sketches of the city, A Trip to Prague features a funny anecdote about the Jewish instinct to make a shidduch.

We Were Exodus*
(France, 2007. 80 minutes. English, French, and Hebrew, with English subtitles.)

In July 1947, a boat known as the “Exodus 47” secretly set sail for Palestine more than 4,500 survivors of the Shoa. Intercepted by the British Navy, the passengers were transferred to three English boats, which after nine days of a difficult journey, returned to Provence at Port-de-Bouc. The emotionally-charged testimony of the ship’s original crew members, along with astonishing original footage of the Exodus, provides new insights into this story.

Yoo-Hoo, Mrs. Goldberg*
(USA, 2008. 18 Minutes.)

Aviva Kempner’s work-in-progress looks at the career of Jewish American actress Gertrude Berg who starred in the long-running radio and television series The Goldbergs.

*New Jersey premiere

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