Israeli Palestinian Film Festival

Synopses

The Bubble - May 1 - 5:30pm

Director: Eytan Fox

The latest from Israeli director Eytan Fox follows three young Israelis who share an apartment in one of Tel Aviv's hippest neighborhood. Trying to put aside political conflicts and focusing on their lives and loves, these progressive 20-somethings are often accused of living in a sort of escapist bubble. Trouble arrives when soldier reservist and music store clerk Noam falls for Palestinian Ashraf.

Bubot Niyar / Paper Dolls - May 5 - 9:00pm

Director: Tomer Heymann
Hebrew: בובות נייר

Throughout the world, struggling people cross borders illegally to find work and make a better life for themselves: Mexicans in the US, Turks in Germany and North Africans in France. But only Israel has a population of illegal Filipinos of indeterminate gender who care for the elderly Orthodox - and for whom they often become substitute children. Paper Dolls follows five such men, refugees from families that reject them, who've made a home in Tel Aviv, Israel's most swinging city. Fast friends, they spend their free time on stage, as the drag queen ensemble, Paper Dolls. A multiple-prize winner at the most recent Berlin Film Festival, the film takes a thoughtful, variously humorous and poignant look at people whose very lives redefine conventional notions of gender, family and love.

Israel, 2006 - 80 minutes - In Hebrew, English & Tagalog with English Subtitles - Strand Releasing

Mechina: A Preperation with Filmmaker Maital Guttman - May 6 - 9:00pm

Director: Maital Guttmann & Madeleine Sackler
Hebrew Title: מכינה

Maital feels no different from her cousin Amitai. They both enjoy music and going to the beach. They both want to work for peace. When they were eighteen, they both worried about graduating from high school and making plans for the future. The difference? At. eighteen, Maital worried about what college she would attend, while Amitai worried about what unit he would enter in the Israeli Defense Force.

In the summer of 2004, Maital launches a journey to discover what it means to be eighteen in israel. Living with Amitai and his five friends as they prepare for their army services, she uncovers the complexity of being young and idealistic in a time of war, as the teens transition from students to soldiers.

United States, 2007 - 40 minutes - English, Hebrew with English Subtitles - Dewdrop Films

Strangers - To Be Determined

Director: Erez Tadmor & Guy Nattiv

Arna's Children - May 13 - 9:00pm

Waiting/Attente - May 19 - 9:00pm

Cancelled

Meduzot / Jellyfish - May 20 - 9:00pm

Director: Shira Geffen & Etgar Keret
Hebrew title: מדוזות

Winner of the Camera d'Or at the 2007 Cannes Film Festival

Poignant, often witty and exceedingly cinematic, Jellyfish (Meduzot), tells the story of three very different Tel Aviv women whose intersecting stories weave an unlikely portrait of modern Israeli life. Batya, a catering waitress, takes in a child apparently abandoned at a local beach. Batya is one of the servers at the wedding reception of Keren, a bride who breaks her leg escaping a locked toilet stall, ruining her chance at a dream Caribbean honeymoon. And attending the event with an employer is Joy, a non Hebrew-speaking domestic worker who has guiltily left her son behind in her native Philippines.

As this distaff trio separately wends their way through Israel's most cosmopolitan city, they struggle with issues of communication, affection and destiny - but at times find uneasy refuge in its tranquil seas.

France and Israel, 2006 - 106 minutes - French and Hebrew with English Subtitles - Zeitgeist Films

Beaufort - May 22 - 9:00pm

Director: Joseph Cedar

Academy Award-nominated film Beaufort tells the story of the days leading up to Israel's withdrawal from Lebanon in 2000 and the soldiers stationed at the mountaintop outpost of Beaufort, who live under a barrage of constant attacks. Frustrated by the knowledge that they are risking--and often losing--their lives in defense of a fortress that will soon be abandoned, the men struggle to do their duty while grieving for their dead comrades and preparing for the evacuation.

In Working Progress - May 23 - 9:00pm

The Band's Visit - May 27 - 9:00pm

Director: Eran Kolirin

The Band's Visit comically tells the story of the Alexandria Ceremonial Police Orchestra, who arrives in Israel to play at the opening of an Arab Cultural Center. Dressed in full regalia and observing all military police protocol, the members of the orchestra are at a pivotal time in their careers. The film explores the themes of cross cultural communication (often speaking with broken, non native English) and isolation (on the part of the band, the community, and the characters).