SUZANNE CHESSLER CONTRIBUTING WRITER
A revelation leaves a family shattered in new
fi
lm by Jeff Lipsky.
I
n Jeff Lipsky’
s new film about a
Holocaust survivor, The Last, the
only Jewish cast member, Rebecca
Schull, portrays the character whose
religious and political background
and beliefs become an
upending shock to her
Jewish family.
Besides seeing the
story unfold, local
viewers can hear the
backstory unfold as
the filmmaker appears
Aug. 2-4 at the Maple
Theater in Bloomfield Township.
“I take themes like families in crisis
and embroider them into patchworks
that are even larger,” Lipsky says about
the seven films he has directed, six
also as writer, beyond his longtime
work as a film distributor.
For The Last, Lipsky combined fact
with fiction to make the fiction seem
plausible.
“I literally infused into my fic-
tional family actual
monsters (such as Dr.
Carl Clauberg) who
participated in the
Holocaust,” Lipsky
says. “They become
vivid characters after
only seeing them one
time in a photograph
[that is understood
to have been taken at
Auschwitz].”
Lipsky, whose earli-
er films have included
a mother-daughter
drama and a hus-
band-wife drama based on his own
failed marriage, started thinking
about the plot for The Last after the
wedding of his nephew to a woman
who converted to Judaism, a situation
which is the starting point for his cur-
rent independent movie.
“
After their wedding, I thought
these are two great characters in
search of a story,” Lipsky says. “My
previous films were always about
multiple generations of families, and
they always featured very strong char-
acters.
“I realized that if I made this couple
part of a family and took them back
one more generation than I usually
did, we would be at the Holocaust.
“With all the virulent anti-Semitism
in the world, I said it was the perfect
time for me to challenge my charac-
ter, myself as a writer-director and
audiences by coming up with a story
about a Holocaust survivor unlike any
that had been told before.”
That’
s how the filmmaker came up
with the character of Claire, and the
plot built organically after that. Other
cast members include Jill Durso, AJ
Cedeño, Reed Birney and Julie Fain
Lawrence.
When Lipsky has held his ques-
tion-and-answer sessions after pre-
vious showings, he has found that
the movie evokes audience interest
in delving further into the characters
and coming up with their
own theories about the
people he has created.
After devising his sto-
ryline, Lipsky explains, he
read about people with
similarly shocking tales.
Lipsky, 65, who has
been the founder of three
film distribution compa-
nies, has worked on pro-
moting 250 films includ-
ing My Life as a Dog,
Stranger Than Paradise
and Sid & Nancy.
He has lived mostly
in New York but currently is in Las
Vegas as he writes his next feature
film, which explores a family crisis
that has to do with the #Me Too
movement. He also plans to produce
part of it in Nevada.
“I’
ve distributed a number of Israeli
films and a number of American films
dealing with Judaism,” he says. “Titles
include Hester Street, Omar and The
Pickle Recipe.” ■
fi
lm
arts&life
Jill Durso and Rebecca
Schull in The Last
Details
The Last will be shown
Friday-Sunday, Aug. 2-4,
at the Maple Theater in
Bloomfield Township.
The filmmaker will
speak after screenings
that begin at 11:45
a.m., 3 p.m. and 6:15
p.m. Tickets start at
$6. (248) 750-1030.
themapletheater.com.
PLAINVIEW PICTURES
Jeff Lipsky
Holocaust Drama
LET US DESIGN YOUR DREAM KITCHEN
LaFata Cabinets manufactures high
quality custom cabinets right here in
Southeast Michigan
August 1 • 2019 39
jn