On behalf of Knesset Israel and the Berkshire Jewish Film Festival, we extend a warm Welcome Back to you as BJFF embarks upon its 38th season. We are so happy to be able to present six Mondays of excellent film programming in person at the Duffin Theater at the Lenox Memorial Middle and High School.
Our screening committee has chosen the best of the many films they watched this year. We are excited to bring you a wide range of documentaries and narrative films from the US, Israel, Germany, Italy and Canada. Please visit our website to read about the films and speakers, sign up for our e-newsletter, make a much-appreciated donation, and purchase your Season Pass. As in past years, individual tickets can only be purchased on the day of the show.(Cash or Check Only)
Schedule:
4pm - Jack and Sam (short)
Jack Waksal and Sam Ron met in 1943 as teenagers when they were sent to a Polish labor camp. Day after day they shoveled coal into boilers to power a factory making munitions for the Nazi war effort. Sam escaped in 1944, surviving in a forest, while Jack was liberated by U.S. troops the following year. Unbeknownst to them, they both landed in Ohio after the war, and they did not see each other until a chance encounter at aFlorida Holocaust event 80 years after their last meeting. This 20-minute award-winning film documents their friendship and their reunion in interviews, film footage and animation that artfully fleshes out the narrative. Director Jordan Horowitz describes his film as a story of positivity, hope and love, more crucial than ever in times when so many people are guided by hatred. This uplifting film, whose executive producers include Sarah Silverman and Juliana Margulies, celebrates the legacy of two friends determined to share their story.
USA 2023, English, Documentary, 20 minutes
Director: Jordan Matthew Horowitz
4pm - Less Than Kosher
This is a look at contemporary Jewish life at its most irreverent – hence its “less-than-kosher” title and a comic film in which Jewish norms are turned on their head. Thirty-year-old Viv was once a rising singing star but now finds herself back in her Jewish mother’s house, with her career hitting one sour note after another. Her life, set in Toronto, takes an unexpected turn when this self-proclaimed Bad Jew reluctantly accepts a position as a cantor at her family’s synagogue, where she escaped in the middle of her own Bat Mitzvah many years before and never looked back. Her antics and adventures as a cantor, which include an affair with the rabbi’s married son and success on TikTok, form a lighthearted, very modern and sometimes absurd take on the spiritual journey and self-discovery of a secular Jew.(Rated R - Language)
USA 2023, English, Narrative, 60 minutes
Director: Daniel Am Roenberg
Date: July 8 - August 12
