Arts&Life
fi
lm
30 | SEPTEMBER 24 • 2020
T
he Lenore Marwil Detroit Jewish
Film Festival will be different in
timing and delivery this year, but
the content will be very much as originally
planned before COVID-19 limited in-per-
son gatherings.
More than 20 films scheduled for the
original theater showings can be seen dig-
itally Oct. 4-30, and there will be plenty of
speakers as interviewed by Elliot Wilhelm,
director and curator at the Detroit Film
Theatre (DFT) and film instructor at
Wayne State University.
Films, often falling into overlapping cate-
gories, will be available for fans specifically
seeking out drama, comedy, documentary,
Israel and Holocaust themes. Examples, in
order of category, include Budapest Noir,
about a crime reporter investigating a mur-
der; Love in Suspenders, about romance the
second time around; Back to Maracanã,
about multi-generational shared experi-
ences; The Rabbi from Hezbollah, about a
spy who becomes a rabbi; and The Mover,
about a man who saved Jews from the
Nazis.
“I realize this is a big change for our reg-
ular audience, and we hope that everyone
gives us a chance and tries it out,
” said Eric
Lumberg, who has been festival chairman
for seven years and is a longtime fan of
independent and foreign films.
“Given the circumstances, we are devel-
oping a new kind of festival that I think
people will love. Our committee watches
between 100 and 150 films depending on
PHOTOS COURTESY OF JCC
This year, view fi
lms digitally at home Oct. 4-30.
SUZANNE CHESSLER CONTRIBUTING WRITER
Jewish
Film Fest
for the
Get Ready
Mossad!
Abe
Chichinette: The Accidental Spy
Here are some notable highlights
from this year’
s selection:
Incitement: This provocative
Israeli historical drama is set in
the days leading up to the 1995
assassination of Prime Minister
Yitzhak Rabin, and follows Yigal
Amir, the Israeli right-wing extrem-
ist who committed the atrocity. It
was selected as the country’
s Best
International Feature Film entry for
the 2020 Oscars.
Abe: For more lighthearted,
family-friendly fare, check out
this comedy about a half-Israeli,
half-Palestinian boy in Brooklyn
(played by Noah Schnapp from
Stranger Things) who sets out to
unite his family through the power
of fusion cuisine.
Chichinette: The Accidental Spy:
This moving documentary pro-
files Marthe Cohn, a 98-year-old
French Jewish woman who reveals
her secret past as a spy in Nazi
Germany. Posing as a German
nurse, Cohn gathered information
on planned Nazi strikes and snuck
the details to French intelligence
following the liberation of Paris.
City of Joel: The New York village
of Kiryas Joel has a huge popula-
tion of Yiddish-speaking, ultra-Or-
thodox Satmar Chasidic Jews …
and their numbers grow by leaps
and bounds every year. This doc-
umentary profiles the local power
struggles over land and resources
between the religious and secular
communities.
Mossad!: This goofy spy spoof
does for Israeli national security
what Get Smart and Austin Powers
did for America’
s secret agents:
milks the whole enterprise for
(kosher) laughs. In fact, American
spoof legend David Zucker
(Airplane!) is a credited consultant
on the film.
ANDREW LAPIN EDITOR
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To See? We’
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