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Filtered By: SFJFF 2017 Clear All

As the Holocaust survivor community ages, the USC Shoah Foundation has embarked on an ambitious new project to transform survivors into 3-D digital projections that will interact with generations to come. 116 Cameras follows Auschwitz survivor Eva Schloss, as she goes through this unique process and reflects on how her role as a Holocaust speaker has changed over time.

In this astonishingly haunting film, deep undercurrents run beneath the simple surface in a quaint village that's ultimately forced to face up to its "ill-gotten gains" from the Second World War.

32 Pills: My Sister's Suicide

32 Pills: My Sister's Suicide

In this heartfelt documentary director Hope Litoff struggles with her own demons as she explores the life and death of her sister, Ruth Litoff. A gifted photographer, Ruth was as lovely as the artwork she created, but she struggled with mental illness throughout her life. The film charts Hope’s excavation of the belongings that Ruth left behind and Hope’s journey of exploration to learn more about her older sister.

The 90 Minute War

The 90 Minute War

In this sharp-edged political mockumentary, a century of intractable conflict between Israel and Palestine is going to be settled once and for all . . . on the soccer field. The region’s leaders, in a desperate attempt, have agreed that one 90-minute match will determine the fate of two peoples: Winner gets to stay, loser goes away. Moshe Ivgy and Norman Issa (Arab Labor) star in a dark satire that scores some serious points.

A Study on Effort: A Duet Between Bobbi Jene and Keir GoGwilt

A Study on Effort: A Duet Between Bobbi Jene and Keir GoGwilt

SFJFF is thrilled to present a rare duet performance from Bobbi Jene Smith and Keir GoGwilt, the subject of Bobbi Jene, in partnership with ODC Theater. She will perform her piece A Study on Effort on August 2.

It's a hot summer day, and for the first time in years Anna (Evgenia Dodina, The Attack, SFJFF 2012) unexpectedly finds herself alone, without her son. She sets out for the day, roaming the streets of her small desert town, looking for a man who can touch her, even if just for one brief moment.

In this compelling and comical saga, two Egyptian soldiers are stranded in the Sinai Desert at the end of the Six-Day War in 1967. Their journey in search of safety and precious water is a testament to human solidarity and the absurdity of war. Exquisitely restored for the film’s 30th anniversary, Avanti Popolo has long been regarded as one of the most important films in the history of Israeli cinema.

Bagels in the Blood

Bagels in the Blood

Nestled between shops in a residential neighborhood in French Montreal lies a quiet brownstone building—an old converted house with a wood fired oven in the back. Irwin Shlafman, third-generation owner of famous bagel shop Fairmount Bagel, shows us how it all started. Screens with Body and Soul: An American Bridge

Be Happy Tonight

Be Happy Tonight

Shuli and Moti are a young Orthodox couple with three children. On a night out together, they travel to the other side of town and decide to change their identities. They want to feel the freedom and temptations that night life has to offer. They slowly start to do things previously forbidden to them. Exposed and confused, they will have to deal with the consequences.

Bending the Arc

Bending the Arc

Thirty years ago, a group of young, enthusiastic, and caring friends came together with a goal that was both simple and complex: to provide health care for all, particularly the poor in the developing world. This inspiring documentary charts the success of Partners in Health, an NGO which builds hospitals and delivers health care throughout the world as they work to bend the arc toward justice.

Ben-Gurion: Epilogue

Ben-Gurion: Epilogue

Featuring never-before-aired footage from a 1968 interview with Israel’s founding prime minister, filmmaker Yariv Mozer (Snails in the Rain, SFJFF 2014) pays homage to one of the icons of Israel’s first generation of political leaders. The resulting film begs the question, what would Ben-Gurion do?, given the current political climate in the Middle East. Viewers can hazard a guess when Ben-Gurion discusses trading land for an enduring peace.

When you first catch sight of the light in her eyes, it is hard to imagine that Sonia Warshawski lived through one of the darkest periods of human history. Yet this 92-year-old, who drives herself to her tailoring business six days a week with a set of brightly painted fingernails and an equally vibrant smile, was forced to come of age in Auschwitz and now shares her story with school children and prisoners alike.

“I want to get to that place where I have no strength to hide anything.” After a decade of stardom in Israel as part of the illustrious Batsheva Dance Company, dancer/choreographer Bobbi Jene Smith at age 30 pursues a solo career in the U.S. Winner of the Best Documentary prize at the Tribeca Film Festival, Bobbi Jene is a portrait of a dancer which is as unflinching, wondrous and embarrassing as life itself.

Body and Soul: An American Bridge

Body and Soul: An American Bridge

“Body and Soul” is the pinnacle of soulful jazz, the most recorded jazz tune ever. Contrary to expectations, it was composed, not by an African American, but by Johnny Green, a Jew. Filmmaker Robert Philipson uses the example of “Body and Soul” to make a larger case: For decades Jews and Blacks found a “bridge” between their cultures through songs about suffering, and the journey was an inspired collaboration.

Bombshell: The Hedy Lamarr Story

Bombshell: The Hedy Lamarr Story

Notorious for a nude scene in the 1933 film Ecstasy, Hedy Lamarr became a sex symbol for the ages and achieved top stardom in Hollywood. But her deeper passion had to do with mechanics and technology. She was obsessed with creating useful inventions to benefit mankind, and her inventions were predecessors of wi-fi, bluetooth and cell phones. Spurned as too beautiful to be smart, she nonetheless upended stereotypes and serves as a role model to this day.

The Boy Downstairs

The Boy Downstairs

Zosia Mamet of GIRLS fame stars in this twentysomething romantic comedy that borrows the aesthetic and location of the popular HBO show. Mamet plays Diana, an aspiring writer who moves back to New York City after living in London. Three years ago she left behind mensch and loving boyfriend Ben (Matthew Shear). Now she returns to discover that he lives in the apartment below hers. Things are about to get complicated.

Bye Bye Germany

Bye Bye Germany

“After World War II approximately 4,000 Jews stayed in Germany. Later, none of them could explain to their children why,” we learn in Sam Gabarski’s Bye Bye Germany. This stylized, humor-laced drama devotes itself to answering this question by portraying the lives of a sundry group of survivors who remain in Germany immediately after liberation and are led by a charismatic, top hat–wearing jokester (Run Lola Run’s masterfully expressive Moritz Bleibtreu).

The Cantor and the Sea

The Cantor and the Sea

Gedaliah, an ultra-Orthodox cantor and eternal bachelor, has a beautiful voice but also has a terrible case of stage fright whenever he has to appear in public. However, when a small community in a sleepy beach town invites him for the New Year prayer, a glimmer of hope enters his heart. The sea, the New Year, and the friendship of a young woman could be his salvation.

Harry Schein, a Jewish refugee from Austria, became Sweden’s “intellectual playboy.” Schein revolutionized the Swedish film industry as a millionaire careerist who had obtained his wealth through a water treatment facility. This eloquent cataloguing of Sweden’s 20th century cultural landscape is the backdrop for the more disturbing accounting of the historical and personal events that shaped Schein’s meteoric rise and tragic fall as he struggled to find his own identity.

This delightful film documents the life of Marcia Nasatir, starting with her childhood as a Jewish girl in Texas and ending up in Hollywood where she broke through the glass ceiling to become the first female vice president of production at United Artists. Featuring clips from films such as Rocky and The Big Chill (which she helped bring to the screen) and interviews with Hollywood luminaries, A Classy Broad details a singular life.

Death in the Terminal

Death in the Terminal

This gripping, Rashomon-style documentary is devoted to unpacking what happened in the span of 18 fateful minutes on October 18, 2015, when gunfire erupted at the Beersheba bus terminal. Winner of numerous awards in both Israel and Europe, it is both an absorbing film as well as a trenchant reminder that in moments of anger and panic the truth can be obscured by fury and fear.

Dina and Scott are in love and planning a wedding, a stressful time for most couples. But they are not a typical couple. Dina is a 49-year-old woman with a tragic past. Scott is a Walmart greeter who lives with his parents. Both are adults on the mental development spectrum for whom love, sexuality and independence are fraught with challenges. Dina chronicles this poignant time in their lives as they search for intimacy and acceptance.

Exodus Sidebar Panel Discussion

Exodus Sidebar Panel Discussion

Following the Castro screening of Stranger in Paradise, SFJFF is pleased to present a panel discussion on the refugee and immigration crisis with Mark Hetfield, Executive Director of HIAS; Amy Weiss, Director of Refugee and Immigrant Services, Jewish Family & Community Services East Bay; Subhi Nahas, Syrian refugee and LGBTQ activist and moderated by Michael Krasny, host of KQED's Forum.

Nicole Opper (JFI Filmmaker in Residence) and her partner Kristan are an Oakland-based queer couple who want to adopt a kid. This comedic doc web series chronicles their journey into the foster care system to become fost-adopt parents. They bumble through a bizarre and bureaucratic maze in order to learn everything they can about the troubled institution on which they are staking their dreams of parenthood. Screens with The Guys Next Door

Facing the Wall

Facing the Wall

Surni, 14, wakes up to the first day without her love, Eli. She is at an Israeli absorption center. She keeps her eyes and ears closed and won’t leave her bed, trying to shut out her new reality and pretending she never left Ethiopia. Screens with Levinsky Park

Fanny's Journey

Fanny's Journey

Riveting from the first frame to the last, Fanny’s Journey is the true and absorbing story of a 13-year-old girl who is separated from her parents in Nazi-occupied France. Fanny is brave and determined and leads her younger sisters and a group of Jewish children towards sanctuary in Switzerland. Expertly directed and well acted, the film emphasizes the resilience of these young heroes and is especially relevant in the present moment.

Freedom of Expression Award: Joe Berlinger

Freedom of Expression Award: Joe Berlinger

SFJFF is honored to present this year's Freedom of Expression Award to Joe Berlinger, Jewish-American filmmaker and fervent believer in the documentary form as an instrument of change. Berlinger will accept the award and sit for an onstage interview at the Castro Theatre following a screening of his newest film Intent to Destroy.

Original and inventive on every level, this story about the legendary filmmaker looks at the emotional truth behind the tales told by the man with the outsize personality and the arch monocle at the moment that he moved away from his epic extravaganzas (Metropolis) to morbid tales of depraved individuals (M). The result is not a reality-based biopic, but rather an attempt to show that the darkest insights into the human psyche originated in the filmmaker himself.

The high-stakes world of futures trading is the backdrop for this moving documentary of a son who returns home to better understand his famous and inscrutable father. Defeated and divorced, filmmaker Jordan Melamed, pursues his father Leo, who is reluctant to discuss his life and tragic WWII childhood. They share painful truths, which will echo with many parents and children, as they struggle to move beyond their fraught past toward forgiveness.

If you think you know Gilbert Gottfried, the brash, shrill-voiced (“Aflac!”), boundary-pushing comic, think again. In this surprisingly candid documentary portrait, director Neil Berkeley reveals the foul-mouthed comedian in a whole new light as a loving husband and father of two young children. Featuring interviews with comics like Whoopi Goldberg and behind-the-scenes glimpses of Gottfried’s performances, Gilbert separates the man from the act, and what emerges is unexpectedly tender.

The Good Postman

The Good Postman

Golyam Dervent, Bulgaria: When gentle village postman Ivan runs for mayor on the platform of welcoming Syrian refugees, the outcome of this humble election (to be decided by fewer than 50 voters) soon takes on all the trappings of a high drama campaign. This often funny, always absorbing documentary that screened at the Sundance Film Festival shows the uneasy confrontation of a small village with the wider world during a time of humanitarian crisis.

The Guys Next Door

The Guys Next Door

The proverbial “girl next door” in The Guys Next Door is anything but a familiar cliché. Rachel is over 40, grew up Jewish and is married with three biological kids of her own when she decides to become a gestational surrogate for her gay best friend and his Italian émigré husband. Not just once but twice! This documentary follows the blended, extended family for three years as they navigate 21st century questions about parenting, identity, intimacy and connection.

Writer/director Ori Sivan’s elegant, understated backstage musical drama is a modern-day adaptation of the Book of Genesis. Sarah is a talented harpist performing in the Jerusalem orchestra of her conductor and husband, the obsessed, Abraham (Alon Aboutboul). Into their childless marriage enters the enigmatic Hagar, a Palestinian horn player who offers to provide the Israeli couple with a child. The film’s finale is an unforgettable and emotional call for harmony between Arabs and Jews.

Heather Booth: Changing the World

Heather Booth: Changing the World

“The most influential person you never heard of” Heather Booth is an organizer who has been at the center of almost every social movement of the past 50 years. From registering Mississippi voters during the 1964 Freedom Summer to joining Elizabeth Warren in the fight against Wall Street banks, Booth has been a formidable force for change. Filmmaker Lilly Rivlin (Grace Paley: Collected Shorts, SFJFF 2010) creates a compelling portrait of an inspiring activist.

Hinda and her Sisterrrz

Hinda and her Sisterrrz

As the Holocaust survivor community ages, the USC Shoah Foundation has embarked on an ambitious new project to transform survivors into 3-D digital projections that will interact with generations to come. 116 Cameras follows Auschwitz survivor Eva Schloss, as she goes through this unique process and reflects on how her role as a Holocaust speaker has changed over time.

After 30 years at sea, veteran seaman Aharon drops anchor in his old hometown to head up the Marine Department at Ashdod Port. Principled Aharon immediately butts heads with the port strongman, Azulay, a respected but unscrupulous local who defends the surly and lazy tugboat crew. As the battle escalates, it threatens Aharon’s safety and loved ones, and he must weigh the importance of his standards against questions of loyalty, love, and family.

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The JFI Archive project seeks to preserve a record of all films exhibited by the Jewish Film Institute and the San Francisco Jewish Film Festival. Our dedication to independent filmmakers ensures quality films are prevented from becoming lost and are recognized far beyond their original screening date. Watch films featured in this archive online on JFI On Demand