Netflix’s eight-part comedy series, The Kominsky Method, created by Chuck Lorre and starring Michael Douglas and Alan Arkin, chronicles the perils of aging in the entertainment industry, which values the vitality, spunk and effervescence of youth. Douglas portrays Sandy Kominsky, a washed-up actor who ekes out a living as an acting coach in Los Angeles. […]
If you take Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at his word, Israel and Saudi Arabia could be on the cusp of establishing diplomatic relations and becoming good neighbors and even allies. This may happen one day, but at the moment, there are no solid indicators that this scenario will pan out. If anything, the Saudis still […]
For the first time ever, the Toronto International Film Festival is paying tribute to one of Hollywood’s greatest directors, Steven Spielberg. From December 21 to January 10, TIFF will host Close Encounters: The Cinema of Steven Spielberg, a retrospective of 28 films he has written, directed or produced. These range from Schindler’s List to Raiders […]
When long-time friends begin to desert you, while your enemies grow stronger, you have little choice, especially if the fate of a country is in your hands, but to make new ones. Israel was once the darling of Europe’s liberal political regimes, but how long ago that now seems. It has been all but abandoned […]
Jews in Nazi-occupied countries were forced to make excruciating decisions as they grappled with the extraordinary perils facing them during the Holocaust. Their survival strategies varied, ranging from coping, compliance and cooperation to evasion, resistance and collaboration, as Evgeny Finkel writes in his superb book, Ordinary Jews: Choice and Survival During the Holocaust (Princeton University […]
Hungarian President Viktor Orban expressed “zero tolerance” for antisemitism during his state visit to Israel last July, but he seems to be having second thoughts five months later. Late last month, Figyelo, a pro-government weekly magazine published in Budapest, ran an inflammatory picture on its cover of Andras Heisler, the head of the Federation of […]
During 16 days in the summer of 1936, all eyes were on Berlin as Nazi Germany hosted the eleventh Olympic Games. Oliver Hilmes’ vivid book, Berlin 1936: Sixteen Days in August (The Bodley Head), published originally in German, recreates this event through a cast of carefully chosen characters and against the backdrop of ominous developments. […]
John Andersen’s Norwegian feature film, The Quake, revels in intimations of an imminent natural disaster. Exuding an expectant atmosphere, it leaves a viewer wondering when all hell will break loose. The sequel to The Wave, which was released in 2015, The Quake opens in Canadian theatres on December 14. It unfolds in and around Norway’s capital, […]
As Nikki Haley, the outgoing U.S. ambassador to the United Nations said, December 6 could have been “a historic day” at the UN. Haley had hoped that a non-binding American resolution condemning Hamas, the first of its kind to be considered by the General Assembly, would pass. “For the sake of peace, and for the […]
Tensions are flaring again between Israel and Hezbollah, Israel’s most formidable adversary and one of Iran’s chief allies in the Middle East. On December 3, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu flew to Belgium to conduct talks with U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Iran’s plans to strengthen Hezbollah — which fought a month-long war with Israel in […]