Film
The Operative
Yuval Adler’s spy thriller, The Operative, turns on Israel’s shadow war with Iran, its strongest and most resourceful enemy. Now available on the Netflix streaming service, it stars Diane Kruger as a Mossad agent who’s sent to Tehran to sabotage Iran’s nuclear program. An Israeli-German co-production, this somber film unfolds in Germany, Israel and Iran in […]
The Irishman: Scorsese’s Tour De Force
Martin Scorsese has translated his fascination with the American Italian mafia into memorable movies like Goodfellas and Casino, both of which were rich in atmosphere, dialog and character. His latest film in the genre, The Irishman, based on Charles Brandt’s book, I Heard You Paint Houses, conforms to this winning formula, and is now available on the […]
The Awakening Of Motti Wolkenbruch
An assortment of stereotypes pop up in Michael Stein’s farce, The Awakening of Motti Wolkenbruch, which is now available on Netflix. Unfolding in a smattering of German, Yiddish and Hebrew, this light, amusing film lampoons two well-worn tropes — the overbearing Jewish mother trying to rein in her rebellious son, and the young Jewish man lusting […]
Frankie, An Appealing Movie Set In Portugal
Ira Sachs’ drama, Frankie, which opens in Canada on November 8, stars Isabelle Huppert as a famous French actress who invites her family, an ex-husband and a friend to Portugal for what may be a final summer vacation. This appealing film, set in the wooded mountains and sandy beaches of the rustic resort of Sintra, […]
Margaret Atwood: Cinematic Portrait Of A Writer
Canadian poet, novelist and essayist Margaret Atwood once said, “I never thought I’d be a popular writer. I only wanted to be a good one.” Several decades on, Atwood has achieved not only popularity but admiration as a stylist. Thanks to her prodigious body of work — 17 books of poetry, 17 novels, 10 works of […]
Cheating Hitler: Surviving The Holocaust
They’re the last of the Holocaust survivors — the Jewish boys and girls who survived the genocidal Nazi onslaught and are now in the final years of their long lives. Maxwell Smart, Rose Lipszyc and Helen Yermus, all Canadian citizens, witnessed the destruction of their respective Jewish communities in Poland and Lithuania. Seventy four years after […]
Fig Tree
It’s 1989 and Ethiopia is being torn apart by a civil war. The country has sunk into the slough of violence and despair and people, particularly Jews, are desperate to leave. Fig Tree, directed by Israeli/Ethiopian filmmaker Aalam-Warqe Davidian, is set during this tumultuous period. Premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival last year, Fig […]
The Cave
For five years, until 2018, the Syrian government of President Bashar al-Assad besieged Eastern Ghouta, a suburb of Damascus populated in the main by Syrians opposed to his totalitarian regime. Following the outbreak of the civil war in Syria in 2011, Eastern Ghouta was regularly pummelled by forces loyal to Assad. In the summer of […]
Pain And Glory
In his semi-autobiographical film, Pain and Glory, the 70-year-old Spanish director Pedro Almodovar conducts a critical examination of himself. In this respect, the title of the movie is appropriate. Salvador (Antonio Bandaras), the aging character who portrays him, has amassed acclaim in his industry, but now he suffers from a rash of debilitating ailments and […]
American Muslim
Adam Zucker’s American Muslim leaves a viewer with a nuanced portrait of Muslims in the United States in the age of Donald Trump. It will be screened at New York City’s DOC NYC, the country’s largest documentary film festival, on November 10 and 12. This impassioned and informative movie tells us that Muslims, comprising one percent of […]
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