“Is it the memory of times long gone, or a presentiment of times to come? Does this old animal perhaps know more than the three generations that foregather in the synagogue each time?”

With so many brief but sublime sentences packed into the short passage comprising Franz Kafka’s unfinished novel “In Our Synagogue,” it is indeed difficult to choose just one excerpt to quote. The reader learns about the stealthy rodent living for years in the narrator’s house of worship, whose coat of fur has acquired the blue-green color of the building’s ancient walls. Well-known to the congregants, especially its women, the animal is not concealed by its faulty camouflage. 

Completed in 2016, “In the Synagogue,” named Best Short Film at this year’s Odessa Film Festival, is inspired by the existing content of Kafka’s story. Director Ivan Orlenko shot portions of his 30-minute black and white movie with Yiddish dialogue in Kiev and inside the mid-19th century Khust synagogue—in use throughout World War II—in southwestern Ukraine.  Conveying an elegiac sense of loss, as well as tragedy, the visual impact of these places amplifies the original tale, now experienced through the hindsight of the Holocaust. As the director notes of this region: “…now only a few preserved synagogues and neglected cemeteries are left…This picture of devastation, the forgotten world, made me film in Yiddish. It is this sense of a long-lost time that predetermined that maximum attention would be drawn to the signs of that time, language and everyday life. Time running indifferently and inexorably, only sometimes allowing the story to finish, is probably what my film is about…”

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The impact of Jewish life on European culture was felt centuries before the dawn of the modern era. The Metropolitan Museum’s Cloisters in Fort Tryon Park is presenting “The Colmar Treasure: A Medieval Jewish Legacy,” an exhibition which shines a light on some of the rare and important medieval Judaica on loan from Paris’ Cluny Museum, almost all of which has never been seen in the United States.
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Discovered in 1863 in the wall of a confectionary located in the Alsatian town of Colmar, The Colmar Treasure dates from the mid-14th century and includes an inscribed dome-shaped Jewish wedding ring, rings and other jewelry embellished with gems and semi-precious stones, and buttons and coins rendered in silver and gold, as well as accessories like belt fragments and headpieces. Among the household items is a tiny, meticulously designed silver key, presumably kept by the lady of the house.

It is assumed that these valuable items were owned by at least one family and were hidden for safekeeping during the time before the town’s Jewish community, who were believed to have poisoned the wells to spread plague, was immolated en masse.  Thereafter, Jews did not return to Colmar for a quarter century.  The installation of The Colmar Treasure is supplemented by the Cloisters’ illuminated books, manuscripts and decorative arts, and includes objects borrowed from the Jewish Theological Seminary and private collections. The show is on view through January 12th, 2020.
 
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The legacy of Europe’s Jewish culture has become key to combatting the rise in anti-Semitism that has occurred worldwide.  Noting this on its website, the European Association for the Preservation and Promotion of Jewish Culture and Heritage (www.jewishheritage.org) sponsored by B’nai B’rith Europe and other Jewish organizations in cooperation with the National Library of Israel has announced that its European Days of Jewish Culture (EDJC) will be designated as a celebration honoring its 20th anniversary.  Held each September, wide-ranging programs organized under a unifying theme are produced by local communities in more than 400 cities in 28 countries.
 
Yale University Press will release another entry in its excellent “Jewish Lives” series of books intended for the general reader on November 19th.  A biography which underscores the continued relevance and vivacity of his songs and musicals, “Irving Berlin: New York Genius” by James Kaplan examines the life of the composer (1888-1989) and his musical output through the history of the frenetic, ever-changing kaleidoscope of the city where he spent most of his life.

It’s great to know that many Jewish people are constantly engaged with their directive of tikkun olam, or healing the world, extending even to their entertainment choices. A glance at the subject matter addressed at Jewish film festivals screened around the country provides the evidence: movies of all genres address a host of pithy topics that range from Holocaust history to the dilemma of the transgender Chabad congregant. At this celebratory time of the year, all-consuming gravitas has the potential to send moviegoers exiting the theater for the nearest happy hour. It’s sometimes difficult to remember that Jews are God’s funniest chosen people.

In this season of light and joy, listing a round-up of some of the year’s funny Jewish movies…well, it couldn’t hurt. The movies were made by people both young and old, but all of them delve into issues that have the potential to make people rethink their relationship to their faith and ethnicity, and the roles that Jews have played in bringing about change for the better, with a sense of fun and good humor. This is a good thing.

As conveyed by its title, “Jewtah,” a film by Jeremy Rishe and Cameron Bossert, transports Jewish viewers to a place they’ve all visited. It could be in Salt Lake City, or anywhere else.  Consumed by his fear of Mormons, or rather, his fear of what he thinks Mormons think about Jews, our hero Pincus hasn’t left the basement of his grandmother’s Utah home for over a decade. When the unthinkable happens, God himself tells Pincus to clean up his act. Although the script is based on his own experiences as a Jew from Utah, it’s a distinct possibility that actor/writer Rishe didn’t really have a mystic encounter with a deity of any kind. However, he certainly enjoyed growing up with Mormons, taking pleasure and pride in being singled out as exotic in a community filled with people who were eager to know his traditions and wished him no harm. Ultimately, Pincus will revel in both his difference and in the ties that he forges with those around him, but you can bet that his “meshuga,” or crazy, road to self-actualization is going to be a bumpy one filled with ups, downs and laughs. 

The viewer rides along Israel’s byways in a bus filled with a gaggle of non-Jewish American stand-up comics in “Land of Milk and Funny,” Avi Liberman’s documentary about the morale-building tour he led in that country during a particularly dark time in the early 2000s. Carrying their big shticks to audiences whose day-to day-lives were affected by the threat of terrorist violence, these comics win over their audiences just by showing up, not to mention their boffo material. For Liberman, the ongoing tours, benefitting a philanthropy which assists victims of terrorism, is “a way to combine what I do for a living with something positive for Israel. …. while it may not make me any more famous or advance my career…the rewards outweigh any of that.” Hailed by the Times of Israel as “both side splitting and moving,” “Milk and Funny” proves that you don’t have to be Jewish to score big laughs in Israel.

Showcasing recently discovered tapes, home movies and diaries, “Love, Gilda” presents an odyssey into the life of Gilda Radner, an original “Saturday Night Live” ensemble member whose zaniness on stage, television and in film delighted millions before she died at the height of her career. SNL luminaries awed by her gifts for physical comedy, over-the-top mimicry and improvisation bring Radner’s presence to life, while the star’s home movies reveal her sweetness and warmth, as well as the courage and humor with which she confronted her illness.  Those of other generations who know her by reputation alone will be captivated by her and will find that much of her work holds up beautifully.
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Our final trip will take many older Jewish viewers back in time, as memories of gilded dragons, beaded curtains, brocade walls and the aromatic bouquet of wonton soup evoke past celebrations of Hanukah and Christmas. Set in a doozy of a 1960s Chinese restaurant, whose staff welcomes customers on Christmas day, “Dreaming of a Jewish Christmas,” is part fantasy, part documentary as filmed by Canadian director Larry Weinstein. In it, he divulges a shocking and hitherto unknown secret: the lyricists, composers and performers who remade Christmas in the 20th century, universalizing the sentiments of the holiday to make it accessible by all, were Jewish.  Told through interesting anecdotes, cultural history and archival material, the story of these musical outsiders is primarily conveyed through their own amazing songs.  Selections by Irving Berlin, Mel Tormé, Jay Livingston and others are sung in diverse styles, from klezmer to country, by musicians including Kevin Breit, Aviva Chernick, Tom Wilson and Dione Taylor, while even the Chinese waiters take their turn as revelers.  Although a nod is given to discussions questioning the morality of cultural appropriation, “Jewish Christmas” functions as an homage to America, and to a time when this kind of terrific thing could happen.

​Cheryl Kempler is an art and music specialist who works in the B'nai B'rith International Curatorial Office and writes about history and Jewish culture for B’nai B’rith Magazine. To view some of her additional content, click here.

An esteemed neurologist, 72-year-old Harvard University professor Dr. Howard Weiner has devoted his life to the treatment of serious diseases like Alzheimer’s and Multiple Sclerosis (MS) — his primary area of expertise — both at the University and at Boston’s Brigham and Women’s Hospital, where he directs the department of immunology. Given the life and death nature of his profession, the doctor was able to approach his next career move — that of filmmaker—with an attitude of nonchalance.  His award-winning documentary “What is Life?” premiered in 2011.

Perhaps contemplating his own future scenario as one of the ranks of the elderly, Weiner began working on a literary treatment of what could be best designated as a “bromance,” the touching and funny story of the offbeat camaraderie that develops between two very different men who meet in a nursing home. Finally brought to fruition as a film script, the project and its potential for success were linked to two important elements, the portrayal of the yin and yang that drives the friendship, and the ability to convey an authentic experience of life in a nursing home, in its sometimes mundane, and often fearful, aspects. The location, inside and out, had to be a real one. 

“If you look at old people from above, you make them children; if you look at them from below, you put them on a pedestal. These are real people. I mean, teenage boys talk like [the characters in the movie.] There’s nothing wrong with older people talking like that. Tolstoy said when he was 80, ‘I’m 80, but inside I feel 20,’” Weiner said when interviewed about the film, which was selected as a 2017 entry at the Tribeca Film Festival.

With a bit of tweaking from Weiner’s son, a successful screenwriter with well-known credits to his name, the script was polished, and in 2016 the filming of “Abe and Phil’s Last Poker Game” commenced, directed by Weiner himself. Among its financial backers were a number of his medical colleagues, who stepped up to the plate even after being warned that they would probably lose their shirts.

Filmed on the premises of an assisted living facility close to Boston, the movie shines a light on the talents of its two seasoned co-stars, the late Martin Landau and Paul Sorvino, both of whom were able work with Weiner to enhance character development, and illuminate the metamorphosis of their onscreen relationship. Landau was cast as the home’s most recent inmate, retired physician Dr. Abe Mandelbaum, who is resigned to going gently into that good night, but whose plans are detoured by the life-affirming personality of his blue collar pal, lusty fellow resident Phil Nicoletti (Sorvino). The friendship they form provides each with a renewed perspective. After a new employee attempts to locate her long lost father at the home, the boys, both eager to indulge in the joys of having a daughter, jockey for the role. As to be expected, the narrative is greased with a pound or two of schmaltz, and is punctuated by a few over the top high jinks, and perhaps too much detail on the specifics of geriatric medical conditions. With Landau’s final performance reviewed by Variety as “a thing of beauty,” “Abe and Phil” can be described as one of a handful of brave and engaging films that compassionately recognize the emotional consequences of the losses inevitable to the aging process. 

RECAP OF JEWISH FILM FESTIVALS

Co-sponsored with Manhattan’s Jewish Museum, The Film Society of Lincoln Center’s eagerly anticipated 27th annual New York Jewish Film Festival, which took place from Jan. 10-23, showcased a wide variety of offerings from around the world, many of which were announced as New York, American or international premieres. Catering to a diverse audience, the screenings included “Across the Waters,” a World War II drama about the ferrying of Danish Jews to Sweden, during the time of Nazi persecution, and a newly restored version of the haunting 1937 Yiddish classic “The Dybbuk.” The film festival also included “The Cousin,” an Israeli thriller in Hebrew and Arabic about a Jewish actor who comes to the defense of his Palestinian handyman, after he is accused of a violent crime. Sam Pollard’s “Sammy Davis Jr: I’ve Gotta Be Me,” a 2017 documentary about the life of the multi-talented entertainer who converted to Judaism during the height of his career was also shown.
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Jewish film festivals will soon open in Atlanta and San Diego.