JIFF films will screen all capital cities around Australia during February and March.
The 2021 selection is stronger than in previous years, many films which entertain but, as might be expected in films from Israel and with Jewish themes, provocative and challenging.
If one had to choose one film (and one hopes audiences will choose many), the recommendation would be the German film, Crescendo. To raise funds for aid work, an entrepreneur approaches a celebrated orchestra conductor to form an orchestra with young musicians, Palestinian and Israeli. This is a dramatic way, with music, to highlight animosities, harshness of life in the occupied territories, Israeli fears and antipathies. Clashes, prejudices. Could music contribute to peace?
Peace issues feature in several documentaries, especially Comrade Dov, about Knesset parliamentarian Dov Khenin, representing a Jewish-Arab party. There is also a portrait of Menachem Begin. Two documentaries, most revealing, focus on American-Jewish relationships: ‘Til Kingdom Come, US fundamentalist Christians and the International Fellowship of Christians and Jews, and Kings of Capitol Hill, with the changing history of AIPAC (American Israel Public Affairs Committee), initially open to dialogue, by the 1990s moving right with some extreme views. They were filmed in 2018, the height of President Trump’s support of Israel – and they play rather differently with the election of President Biden.
There is also a short documentary, Holy Silence, which traces the stances of the Vatican towards Nazi Germany, more overt criticism by Pius XI and the diplomatic choices made by Pius XII.
One of the features of this year’s festival is the number of films set in the World War II years in Europe, in France, in Italy and Rome, but also in Eastern Europe with dramas set in Poland, Latvia, Hungary, Russia, all honouring the persecuted and the dead. A striking drama is Persian Lessons, the story of a Belgian Jew who pretended to be a Persian in the concentration camp where the commandant wanted to learn Farsi to join his brother in a Teheran restaurant after the war.
Two contemporary stories offer interesting characters and issues, Esau, set in Israel, something of an updating of the story of Esau and Jacob. The Italian drama, Non Odiare, Thou Shalt not Hate, set in Trieste, where a Jewish surgeon is targeted by neo-Nazis and who is challenged in his prejudices.
A strong selection of films screening over a month.
Images: Clockwise from top left: Crescendo, When Hitler Stole Pink Rabbit, Persian Lessons, The Last Vermeer, Kings of Capitol Hill and ‘Til Kingdom Come.