Habonim Documentary Film Screenings

We are pleased to announce the launch of the Habonim International Documentary Film Festival.

Every now and again relevant and interesting movies are brought to our attention and we plan to screen them at 5 Glen Park Avenue. Wherever possible the screening will be followed by a panel discussion consisting of relevant experts, hopefully the film’s director and others with intimate knowledge and experience of the subject.

We ask for a voluntary donation at the door to cover expenses associated with each screening event.

Please join us. Bring a friend. If you would like to be added to our invitation list, please send your request to office@congregationhabonim.org.

If you know of any documentary film maker who would like to submit a film to us for screening, please have them contact Eli Rubenstein (uiaeli@passport.ca) or Paul Kuttner (office@congregationhabonim.org).

Past Screenings

"The Name My Mother Gave Me"

A group of Israeli adolescents - Ethiopian & Russian ‹ take a pre-Army trip to Ethiopia. One boy searches for his mother, who he has not seen in 14 years; the group stops at familiar places, a waterfall they once swam in, an abandoned synagogue. The trip helps the Ethiopians reconcile their Israeli and Ethiopian identities, fosters genuine understanding among the Ethiopian & Russian students, and leads to a renewed commitment to their adoptive home in Israel.

Special Guest Appearance by Film Director: Eli Tal-El

"One of Israel’s Best Documentary Films of the Last 40 Years." Israel Broadcasting Authority’s Documentary Department.

"....a thoughtful & moving study of the quest for identity and understanding." Jerusalem Report

Leaving the Fold

LEAVING THE FOLD is a documentary film which tells the story of five young people born and raised within the ultra-Orthodox Jewish world who no longer wish to remain on the inside. As children, they grew up in a closed society where deviation from the rules of conduct is often punishable by ostracism, intimidation or worse. As young adults, they pay a steep price for abandoning their parents and community to seek the freedom to make their own choices.

From the Hasidic enclaves of Montreal, Brooklyn and Jerusalem come stories of conflict, coercion and struggle. Tinged with pain and unexpected humor, Leaving the Fold documents the process by which our five heroes emerged from a strictly controlled society into a baffling secular world of endless choices: What should I wear? What shall I become? Who will I marry? Once everything was decided for them. Now they must decide for themselves. But the answers don’t always come easily.

Ochberg’s Orphans

1921. In Russia a million children are without parents after six years of war, famine and disease. 300,000 of them have been orphaned by murderous anti Semitic attacks, their lives hanging by a thread. In South Africa, businessman Isaac Ochberg dreams a dream of saving some of these helpless and lost souls. Filmed in the original locations, together with unique archive footage and testimony from survivors, "Ochberg's Orphans" reveals this unknown story of heroism. Today, in a century dominated by wars, genocides and displaced peoples, Ochberg's legacy is a reminder that a small act can make a big difference.

Killing Kasztner

Directed by Gaylen Ross, the documentary Killing Kasztner was eight years in the making. Dr. Israel Kasztner, a Hungarian Jew, was one of the leaders of a small Zionist rescue organization in Budapest. Kasztner negotiated with Adolf Eichmann to allow 1700 Jews to leave Hungary by train in exchange for money, gold, and diamonds. What is unknown is what else, if anything, Kasztner had to promise or deliver to assure the heart-stopping rescue. The "Kasztner Train," as it was called, was held hostage for a time in the Bergen Belsen concentration camp, eventually arriving to safety in Switzerland. After Kasztner moved to Israel, he was accused of being a collaborator and fought a vicious libel battle in a trial that condemned him as "the man who sold his soul to the Devil." Though the verdict against Kasztner was overturned in a 4 to 1 decision by the Supreme Court, he didn't live to see it. He was gunned down at his Tel Aviv doorstep a year earlier by right wing Jewish extremist Ze'ev Eckstein in 1957. In the more sensational aspect of the film, after 50 years the assassin breaks his silence about the fateful night he pulled the trigger, killing Kasztner. Eckstein reveals step by step his transformation into an assassin -- the events and passions that turned a young man into an agent of politics and revenge.

Act of God

From the award-winning director of "Manufactured Landscapes" Jennifer Baichwal (www.mercuryfilms.ca) comes Act of God, a documentary about the metaphysical effects of being struck by lightning. The film explores the paradox of being singled out by randomness through seven stories from around the world that raise and respond to the questions about chance, fate, and the meaning of life, while keeping the sky and what comes out of it as a central visual metaphor and thread. Paul Auster, the best-selling novelist who was struck as a teenager, anchors the film, along with improvisational musician, Fred Frith, whose original compositions demonstrate the ubiquity of electricity in our bodies and in the universe. See www.apple.com/trailers/independent/actofgod/