Security up and crowds down at Windsor Jewish fest, and a French romantic icon

The 21st annual Windsor Jewish Film Festival is off to a great start at a different location this year, the downtown Capitol Theatre. The city’s Jewish federation said there would be stepped-up security and so there has been, with a well identified city police cruiser parked right in front of the theatre entrance on University Ave. and with a few officers outside or in the lobby. Opening night for the documentary The Catskills (Lex Gillespie) took place in the main Pentastar Theatre but subsequent nights (the fest continues through today with three films per day) are in the smaller Kelly Theatre. Are crowds smaller? It would seem so and there might be a good reason, given international political events which have spread currents worldwide including here. But there’s nothing to fear. Security is tight, food and beverages available, and those who have been attending are having a good time. As for the films,  Listen (Omri Bezalel), uncannily depicts a situation that is similar to the current conflict between Israel and Hamas, about a determined young IDF officer whose dilemma is to save an Israeli prisoner or eliminate future terrorist threats. Very realistic, I was surprised it was made in the United States and not Israel. Meanwhile, The Man in the Basement (Philippe Le Guay) poses the dilemma of whether free inquiry should be tolerated even if it questions an historical event like The Holocaust. I was slightly surprised to see it in the lineup, and while powerfully acted and suspenseful, even the filmmakers come to no conclusion, as the events depicted end abruptly, making me wonder if they copped-out.

The death of French film star, Anouk Aimée at 92, affected me more than most acting deaths. She was a great beauty who, in one obit, is described as appealing to “unreconstructed romantics.” That’s me! She’s best remembered for her role in Claude Lelouch’s 1966 A Man and a Woman with Jean Louis Trintignant. But, as coincidence would have it, last Sunday I watched Federico Fellini’s famed 1963 8½, which also stars her as protagonist film director Guido Anselmi’s (Marcello Mastroianni) wife Luisa. I didn’t recognize her at first, her hair cropped short and wearing thick 1960s era squarw glasses. I would never have suspected the same woman who, while attractive, didn’t have the allure of the longer haired beauty in Lelouch’s film. Superficial appearances run deep! As for 81/2, which I’d seen snippets of in the past and is considered one of the best films ever made, I found myself at the end of it reflecting “This is two hours and 18 minutes of my life I’ll never get back.” With no real plot line, discombobulated sets and entourages prancing around hither and yon among, it looks like a film made up on the fly.  

Movies galore this month at Windsor Jewish fest and a WIFF local retrospective

This year’s Windsor Jewish Film Festival is on the horizon, with the opening feature The Catskills kicking it off next Monday night. It will be followed by nine films over the next three days. The Catskills, helmed by director Lex Gillespie, tells the story of the famous Jewish resorts in upper New York State during their heyday in the 1950s and 60s. The fest's main schedule gets underway Tuesday with Sabotage, the unknown story of a women’s underground operation at the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp. Then the film Listen, more than appropriate for our time, is the story of a young Israeli soldier who searches to find her captured colleague in Gaza. That evening the film Syndrome K, narrated by Ray Liotta, depicts an incredible episode where Italian doctors rescued Jews during the Holocaust by inventing a fictitious disease that kept the Nazis at bay. On Wednesday there's the Toronto-set musical Less Than Kosher, where a “wayward singer's life takes a divinely uproarious turn when she lands a cantor gig in her family's synagogue, sparking self-discovery, family mishigas, and unholy chaos.” Also screening that day is The Man in the Basement, a contemporary take on how antisemitism inadvertently affected one family. Later Running on Sand is about a young Eritrean refugee living in Israel and who disguises himself as a famous soccer player. Thursday also sees three films: The Story of Annette Zelman, a WW II story of star-crossed lovers of different religions and based on real events. Home depicts the challenges of an Orthodox man’s professional dream which is perceived as a threat to his ultra-Orthodox community. Finally, The Narrow Bridge is about the friendship between Israeli and Palestinian people united, having “lost a child or parent in violent conflict, transform their grief into a bridge for reconciliation.” Films are at the Capitol Theatre.

This will be a great month for movie watching in Windsor. Following the Jewish fest and celebrating its 20th anniversary, the Windsor International Film Festival hosts its first Local Retrospective the weekend of June 21-23 at the Capitol Theatre. These might even be considered Windsor classics, shot here or affiliated with Windsorites and having screened over the years at WIFF. Titles are 100 Films and a Funeral, Best of Mark Boscariol 48-Hour Flickfest, The Birder, Iodine, Kili Klimb, Last Call, Once Were Brothers: Robbie Roberston and The Band, The Quick and Dirty, Reset, The Rise and Fall of the Grumpy Burger, Saving Grace, Sometimes I Think About Dying, This is What a Feminist Sounds Like  and WIFF Shorts 1 & 2.