ARTS&LIFE
FILM FESTIVAL

F

ilm fans who have missed the ambi-
ence of watching big-screen cinema 
while joined by other viewers can 
look forward to opportunities for that 
experience at the Jewish Community 
Center (JCC) in West Bloomfield. 
The Lenore Marwil Detroit Jewish Film 
Festival, running April 24-May 4, invites 
movie enthusiasts into the Berman Center 
for the Performing Arts with an offering 
of nearly 30 films — dramas, comedies, 
documentaries — and seven filmmaker 

presentations. 
Home viewers can enjoy their own JCC 
film opportunities as part of the festi-
val — only after the theater showings are 
completed. Ten films will be available vir-
tually May 5-8 also with the enhancement 
of pointed discussion.
“We are so thrilled to be back in person 
presenting films from the United States as 
well as other countries that include Israel, 
France, Spain and the Netherlands,” said 
Stephen Kantrowitz, the new senior direc-

tor of Cultural Arts at the JCC. 
“Our Film Festival Committee, chaired 
by Eric Lumberg, has maintained the 
highest of standards in making this year’s 
selections and has set off the first day 
with three screenings that involve special 
programming.”
The film Fiddler’s Journey to the Big 
Screen, at 1 p.m., will have the mood set 
by a live fiddler entertaining in the lobby 
before and after the screening. A Tree of 
Life, at 4 p.m., will be accompanied by 
an on-screen presentation moderated 
by Rabbi Joseph Krakoff and featuring 
director Trish Adlesic and author Mark 
Oppenheimer, who wrote the book 
(Squirrel Hill: The Tree of Life Synagogue 
Shooting and the Soul of a Neighborhood), 
on which the film is based. 
Image of Victory, at 7 p.m., which is 
about an attack at a 1948 kibbutz, will 
feature a pre-recorded interview with 
director Avi Nesher being questioned by 
Detroit Shaliach Yiftah Leket.
The festival centerpiece is set for 7 
p.m. Sunday, May 1, with the presen-

Want to Go to 
the Movies?

APRIL 21 • 2022 | 53

The Lenore Marwil Detroit Jewish Film 
Festival is back in person.

SUZANNE CHESSLER CONTRIBUTING WRITER

Still shot from 
the film Fiddler’s 
Journey to the 
Big Screen

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