The Atlanta Jewish Film Festival is not only the largest film festival in Atlanta, it's one of the largest Jewish film festivals in the world. Fewer than 2,000 people attended when it was established 20 years ago by the American Jewish Committee. But when the annual event returns Feb. 10-27, roughly 40,000 people are expected to attend. Spanning 18 days, the festival will host screenings of 48 feature-length films and 16 shorts at seven venues across the city.
Executive director Kenny Blank attributes the festival’s growth to “not straying from its origins and the ingredients responsible for its success.”
Those origins include spotlighting films that explore Jewish life through the lenses of filmmakers from around the globe making comedies, dramas, documentaries and shorts. Considering the diverse range of genres, viewers might wonder: What exactly makes a film Jewish?
Blank said that’s something programmers “wrestle with constantly.”
“We define Jewish cinema as broadly as possible because ultimately the stories, characters and subject matter of these films are inexorably intertwined with communities the world over. There is no topic or story that is off limits, so long as it can be catalyzed in a uniquely Jewish way,” he said.
Atlanta Jewish Film Festival (AJFF) movies don’t resemble those typically seen in theaters, he said.
“Audiences will be entertained, yes. But they can also expect to come away challenged, provoked, educated, moved and transformed,” he said. “This is a chance to journey beyond our everyday familiar life experiences and walk in the footsteps of history or be immersed in cultures from around the world.”
Here are some suggestions of movies to check out at this year’s festival, including three world premieres.
Trio of global debuts
“Shared Legacies: The African-American Jewish Civil Rights Alliance” (7:30 p.m. Feb. 10, Cobb Energy Performing Arts Centre) will debut on the festival’s opening night. Directed by Shari Rogers, it showcases the bond between the African-American and Jewish communities beginning with the founding of the NAACP in 1909 founding. Featuring Atlanta icons such as Congressman John Lewis and U.N. Ambassador and former Atlanta Mayor Andrew Young, the film explains how the connection between the communities has been revived since the civil rights movement.
Despite its focus on two specific communities, Rogers believes the film speaks to everyone.
“This historical alliance offers a blueprint or template for other alliances — not just for blacks and Jews — to come together and fight against bigotry and hate,” Rogers said.
Also making its world premiere is Atlanta director Adam Hirsch’s humorous, short documentary “No Pork on the Fork,” (11 a.m. Feb. 23, Regal Perimeter Pointe). the 22-minute, behind-the-scenes look at the Atlanta Kosher BBQ Festival is presented as part of the AJFF’s four-part Shorts Program. The film provides an amusing and tasty glimpse at the seventh annual competition that unites communities. Held in October, the event draws 3,000 annually to watch Kosher caterers and chefs cook meals on two Weber grills.
Originally from Nashville, Hirsch is an Emmy-winning graduate of the University of Georgia. He landed on the Atlanta Jewish Times’ 40 Under 40 list in 2017 and has directed other AJFF-screened shorts in past years, including 2017’s “Schube Strong,” about an Atlanta family’s battle with cancer.
Rounding out the trio of world premieres is “Curl” (6:15 p.m. Feb. 23, Landmark’s Midtown Cinema). Co-directed by Shalom Hager and Sigalit Lipshitz, the 24-minute short drama chronicles a shattering tragedy in the life of an Hasidic father of four struggling to support his family.
History gets personal
“Incitement” (multiple screenings including 3:15 p.m. Feb. 19, Regal Perimeter Pointe), Israel’s Best International Feature Oscar submission, is a psychological thriller that depicts the journey of Yigal Amir from law student to assassin of Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin in 1995. The feature film dramatizes Amir’s shooting of Rabin at a peace rally. The then-25-year-old college student confessed to killing Rabin, saying he did it to stop the Oslo Accords between Israel and the Palestinian Liberation Organization.
Hundreds of hours of phone conversations with Amir, who remains in prison, helped inform the film written and directed by Yaron Zilberman.
“It’s a general attitude that he was super rational and logical,” Zilberman said of Amir. “He’s a human being. He’s not like a crazy guy. … There’s no argument about his responsibility, but at the same time, we’re talking about a human being who could have been my friend.”
Another larger-than-life figure — literally — is explored in the documentary “Aulcie” (multiple screenings including 1:45 p.m. Feb. 14, Regal Perimeter Pointe). It follows 6’10” Israeli-American basketball icon Aulcie Perry’s story of fame, fall from grace and redemption. The failed NBA star from Newark, New Jersey, joined Maccabi Tel Aviv and led the team to an unexpected win in the 1977 European Championship. He converted to Judiasm, changed his name to Elisha Ben Avraham and gained Israeli citizenship. But in 1987, he was imprisoned for smuggling heroin from Amsterdam to the U.S. Upon his release a decade later, he found salvation as a youth basketball coach.
Perry was Israeli director Dani Menkin’s childhood hero.
“I feel very lucky to be the one telling that story. I was chasing after him for more than 20 years,” said Menkin.
The closing night film, “Saul & Ruby, To Life!” (2:30 p.m. and 7 p.m. Feb. 27, Sandy Springs Performing Arts Center), is an uplifting documentary directed by Tod Lending about Holocaust survivors Saul Dreier, whose parents were killed in a concentration camp, and Reuwen “Ruby” Sosnowicz, who escaped the Nazi invasion in Poland. The two men met in 2014 and started the Holocaust Survivor Band with Sosnowicz on keyboards and accordion and Dreier on drums. They perform upbeat, pre-war klezmer music at Florida assisted-living facilities to promote peace and healing.
The documentary follows the duo as they take their show on the road.
“Saul was turning 90 and Ruby was 85,” said Lending when asked what attracted him to Saul and Ruby’s story. “They had amazing stories of how they survived the Holocaust, went on to emigrate to America, raise families and lead productive lives. And now, in their twilight years, they were embracing the healing power of music, taking care of their ill wives and hoping to one day return to Poland to play their music, to tell their stories and send a message of world peace as the world becomes more divided.”
A performance by the Holocaust Survivor Band and a dessert reception will follow the screening.
Character deep-dives
“Standing Up, Falling Down,” (multiple screenings, including 8 p.m. Feb. 15, Woodruff Arts Center) features a true king of comedy.
Starring Billy Crystal and Ben Schwartz, this buddy comedy follows two unlikely friends, one a struggling comic and the other a disillusioned bar fly. Schwartz’s Scott reluctantly moves back in with his parents after failing to break into the Los Angeles comedy scene. He meets Crystal’s Marty, a dermatologist who drinks his troubles away. Together they bond over their regrets and failures. It’s Matt Ratner’s directorial feature film debut, but his production credits include the dramedy thriller “Manson Family Vacation.”
Director Ivy Meeropol has a personal stake in her documentary “Bully. Coward. Victim. The Story of Roy Cohn” (multiple screenings including 1 p.m. Feb. 25, Landmark’s Midtown Art Cinema). Her grandparents were Ethel and Julius Rosenberg, American citizens convicted of espionage on behalf of the Soviet Union and executed in New York in 1953. Roy Cohn was a prosecutor in that trial.
Cohn also investigated suspected communists for Sen. Joseph McCarthy and was a mentor for a young Donald Trump. The documentary is a profile of a closeted, conservative power broker who Meeropol describes as a “self-hating homosexual and Jew.”
Nevertheless, Meeropol said she wants viewers to “not take the easier route, to look at someone like Roy Cohn and say, ‘He’s just evil.’ I want to challenge people to try to empathize with someone they think is evil.”
In addition to the screenings, the AJFF presents a robust program of Q&As and post-screening discussions with filmmakers, actors and community leaders to help shed light on the festival's films. Check the website at www.ajff.org for details.
EVENT PREVIEW
Atlanta Jewish Film Festival. Feb. 10-27. $16. Multiple venues. 404-528-2614, www.ajff.org.
Opening night: "Shared Legacies: The African-American Jewish Civil Rights Alliance." 7:30 p.m. Feb. 10. $36. Cobb Energy Performing Arts Centre, 2800 Cobb Galleria Parkway, Atlanta. A Q&A with community activist Martin Luther King III, actor Louis Gossett Jr. and others will follow the screening.
Closing night: "Saul & Ruby, To Life!" 7 p.m. Feb. 27. $36. Sandy Springs Performing Arts Center, 1 Galambos Way, Sandy Springs. Dessert reception and a performance by the Holocaust Survivor Band follow the screening.
