Tal Zide is not your typical filmmaker. A recent graduate of Reali High School in Haifa, Israel, her short film, "A Few More Hours" (2007), is about the death of her cousin during the Second Lebanon War. On the verge of enlisting in the Israeli army for the next two to three years, Zide made a documentary that carries a special resonance for her and her classmates who assisted with the film as part of their senior thesis project.
"I got into a place I never would have gotten into without this film," Zide told the audience in the Coolidge Corner Theatre on Sunday. "I had the unique opportunity to ask questions."
The film covers the experience of the Shtokelmans, who lost their son Gilad only two months before the documentary was shot. Zide goes on an emotional journey with the family as they reconnect with their love of playing music, with some finding closure through the film, while others, according to Zide, are still coming to terms with Gilad's death two years later.
The poignant 18-minute-long film intertwines family interviews with songs Gilad wrote before joining the army. One song, "A Few More Hours," after which the film is named, was discovered after Gilad's death and now regularly plays on the radio in Haifa. Zide weaves Gilad's music into her film, allowing her cousin's voice to permeate her work. "I wanted to make a certain statement," Zide said when introducing her film. Her statement is not a judgment of the war or her cousin's decisions, but on his life and what he loved.
"A Few More Hours" was the winner of the Haifa-Boston Partnership Award for Young Haifa-based Creators at last year's Haifa International Film Festival. Zide's film, along with two other short films that competed for the award -- "15 Minutes" (2007) by Noa Barash and "Young Ambassadors" (2007), a compilation film -- were screened Sunday as part of the 20th Annual Boston Jewish Film Festival.
This year, many of the films selected for the festival are by young, Generation X directors. In the festival's program, Sara Rubin, the event's executive director, described the movies as reflecting "a new generation's exploration of age-old issues: the Holocaust, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and what it means to be Jewish in a non-Jewish world." Generation X filmmakers approach these issues with an entirely new perspective. Raised in the 1980s, a time of relative peace, they are now searching for answers, and their reexamination of history comes out in their work. Their films offer a new perspective on past events, and they consist of musical scores and pacing rhythms that express their techno childhoods.
Included in the festival is Tufts/School of the Museum of Fine Arts (SMFA) alum Cindy Kleine's (LA '82) film "Phyllis and Harold" (2008), which will be screened this Sunday at 3 p.m. She has done mostly documentary work -- compiling footage of her family over 12 years, doing interviews, chronicling home movies and coming up with a moving product about her parents' tumultuous 59-year-long relationship.
The festival features a diverse scope of work, from Sundance selection "Strangers" (2007) to the star-studded "Emotional Arithmetic" (2007) to the irresistible "Love and Dance" (2006), among many others. "Strangers" especially has been an enormous success at the festival, and tickets are quickly selling out. Directors Erez Tadmor and Guy Nattiv's film is a high-wire love act shot entirely without a script, improvised from beginning to end.
The maturity and creativity of the young filmmakers chosen for the Boston Jewish Film Festival make their works the best contemporary movies from around the world on Jewish themes. They break away from previous conventions, presenting something entirely new, yet still manage to find words that speak to all generations.
The festival launched its 20th anniversary event on Oct. 27, and it continues until Nov. 20. Venues are located all over Boston, including the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, the Institute of Contemporary Art and the Coolidge Corner Theatre. Check bjff.org for upcoming screenings and ticket sales. All student tickets are $10, bought either in advance or at the various locations around the Boston area.
