Adios Paula

Posted on April 18, 2012 by

Filmmaker Paula Markovitch has left Chicago & is now on her way to another film festival in Seoul, South Korea.

She did Q&A sessions after the two screenings of her remarkable first feature The Prize at our Chicago Latino Film Festival & luckily I was able to attend both.

I won’t kid you: The Prize is a difficult & painful film about a 7 year old girl hiding from the authorities during Argentina’s “Dirty War” in 1977. Cecilia’s father has already “disappeared,” & her mother Lucia alternates between stubborn resistance & depressed exhaustion. Altho she clearly loves her daughter very much, living in fear is sapping Lucia’s strength, & she has very little ability to cope with her child’s antics.

But knowing it is a semi-autobiographical story gives us the ray of hope needed to fully appreciate it without turning away. Paula has lived to tell this story. Her childhood travails have made her a great artist & I am so pleased that I was able to spend time with her.

A full interview with Paula will be posted soon. She told me she is already working on her next film, so hopefully we will see her here in Chicago again some day.

Adios Schvester Paula! L’Hitraot v’ Hasta Manana :-)

Photo Credits

Paula with Jan & Monica under the yellow lights outside the Rosebud on Taylor Street after Saturday screening: Jim (4/14/12)

Paula during Monday Q&A: Jan Lisa Huttner (4/16/12)

With Jan after Monday screening: Bev Chubat (4/16/12)

Paula surrounded by Audience Members (4/16/12)

 

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CLFF The Prize

Posted on April 12, 2012 by

April 14 Update: OK now we’ve seen it & we all loved it (“we” = Jan & Rich plus Monica & Jim). HIGHLY RECOMMENDED, so attend the 2nd screening on Monday @ 6:15 PM if possible. This is a difficult film to watch but beautifully done & very worthwhile.

Mazel Tov, Schvester Paula!

Alas, as always happens, Jewish-themed films arrive at our annual Chicago Latino Film Festival without obvious markers… But as soon as I scan the list of festival guests, my JewDar kicks in. And so, even though CLFF staff didn’t realize the characters in The Prize were Jewish, I saw the filmmaker’s name (Paula Markovitch) & immediately began Googling…

And here’s what popped up first on the Jerusalem Film Festival website:

“Argentina, the 1970s, at the height of the ‘dirty war’ waged by the military junta that ruled the country from 1976 to 1983. A mother and her seven-year-old daughter arrive in a remote coastal region. Though it is not explicitly stated, it is clear that the family is Jewish. The desperate mother decides to send Cecilia to school—with instructions to tell that her mother is a housewife and that her father (who has in fact disappeared), has a curtain shop in the city. When the girl writes an essay on the subject of ‘Our Army,’ terrible problems are in store for daughter and mother. When a rewritten, patriotic version is sent to the national competition, and wins first prize, the threat to the family becomes even greater.”

In their statement giving Markovitch their “In the Spirit of Freedom” Award for 2011, the JFF Jury members said:

“For her fascinating artistic ability based upon the director’s autobiography, emphasizing the feeling of anxiety, detachment, and persecution of the mother and daughter under the repressive fascist regime of 1970s Argentina. For making use of unique cinematic means, Markovitch succeeds in reaching emotional intimacy with the characters while motivating the actors specifically the young girl in the main role, in a touching and convincing manner.”

I haven’t seen it yet, so I can’t make my own personal comments except to say that Paula Markovitch will be our guest in Chicago starting tomorrow, & her first feature film has already accumulated an impressive array of international accolades in addition to recognition from the JFF described above.

CLIFF screenings are Sat (4/14) @ 3:45 PM & Mon (4/16) @ 6:15 PM, & both screenings are at the Landmark Century in Lincoln Park.

Click HERE to purchase tickets. Me, I have my tickets for the 4/14 screening so if you’re there too, then please find me & say hi :-)

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Nathan Englander’s Parsha

Posted on April 12, 2012 by

From April ’12 Spotlight: Nathan Englander came to the Harold Washington Library Center in February to read from What Do We Talk About When We Talk About Anne Frank, his latest collection of short stories. As the translator of New American Haggadah, Englander is actually promoting two books right now, and although they are outwardly very different, common threads soon became evident.

Over dinner at the Berghoff, I zeroed in on the story “Sister Hills.” Neighbors for decades, in war and at peace, two women who live side-by-side in a West Bank settlement make a solemn agreement in a moment of great fear. “More than anything that I’ve ever written, this book has really been a Rorschach Test,” said Englander. “I thought you might be headed there.” Yes he was schmoozing with a woman the same age as the characters in this story, but it turned out we had a deeper connection.

“My father’s yahrzeit was last week and the Torah reading was Mishpatim,” I said. “So questions of slavery and ownership are fresh on my mind.” “Mishpatim! That was my bar mitzvah parsha!” said Englander. “Writing is fraught. The process is crazy. But when I finished ‘Sister Hills,’ I did not sleep that night. I couldn’t. I was so rattled by it.”

Then he became speculative: “Something about doing the Haggadah project gave me the distance to look at my process anew and it allowed me to write more close…You’re making me think now of how memory is formed.”

In the midst of crafting new stories (“I’m going to tell the whole history of West Bank settlement in a single short story.”), Englander had gone back to the Hebrew text of our foundational story, and transformed the opening words of the Haggadah into these English words: “You are blessed, Lord God-of-Us, King of the Cosmos.” Now families all around the world will gather together this Passover and say these words, and this is how memories are formed.

Englander returns to Chicago on Thursday, April 26 to do an evening program—one of the iDays events—with Israeli author Etgar Keret at Chicago Sinai Congregation. For tickets, visit: www.ChicagoHumanities.org.

To read Mishpatim (Exodus 21:1 – 24:18) in the JPS Tanakh, visit www.jtsa.edu/PreBuilt/ParashahArchives/jpstext/mishpatim.shtml.

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We Are Here

Posted on April 12, 2012 by

From April ’12 Spotlight: Ellen Cassedy spoke about her new book We Are Here: Memories of the Lithuanian Holocaustat KAM Isaiah Israel in Hyde Park in March, and she is returning for a program sponsored by the Balzekas Museum of Lithuanian Culture (near Midway Airport) on Sunday, April 29.

We Are Here—the title of which is taken from the famous partisan resistance song—”Zog Nit Keyn Mol“-records Cassedy’s personal journey to Lithuania, juxtaposing the memories of relatives now living in America against the memories of Christians still living in and around Vilnius.

Although her mother’s Jewish family all fled Lithuania, Cassedy’s father’s family came from Ireland. Did her name, her complexion, and her red-gold hair help disarm people who might have been more guarded in face-to-face conversation with someone as Jewish-looking as I am?

Cassedy’s co-presenter on April 29 will be Ruta Sepetys, author of Between Shades of Gray, a highly-regarded novel about a Lithuanian family’s exile to Siberia during the Soviet era. For tickets, call (773) 582-6500, or visit the museum website: http://www.BalzekasMuseum.org.

To hear Chava Alberstein sing “Zog Nit Keyn Mol” in Yiddish, visit www.youtube.com/watch?v=-wgYnYSg3Zs&feature=related

Right Photo: Ellen with KAMII Member Joan Levin

Bottom Photo: Ellen with Jan

Photo Credits: Richard Bayard Miller (3/4/12)

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Mazel Tov, Cyndee!

Posted on April 12, 2012 by

From April ’12 Spotlight: Cyndee Schaffer’s book Mollie’s War: The Letters of a WWII WAC in Europe just won first place in the 2012 Royal Dragonfly Contest in the Biography/Autobiography/Memoir category!

Schaffer has numerous public appearances planned for the spring, including Monday, April 23 at the next Chicago Jewish Authors Literary Series (hosted by Max and Benny’s Restaurant in Northbrook). For more details, visit the “Speaking Engagements” section of her website: www.MolliesWar.com.

Read more about Mollie’s War in my February ’11 column: http://SecondCityTzivi.com/2011/03/30/feb-11-spotlight/.

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CLFF Reus

Posted on April 12, 2012 by

From April ’12 Spotlight: This year the 28th annual Chicago Latino Film Festival (CLFF) brings us Reus from Uruguay. Barrio Reus is the name of a Jewish enclave in Montevideo, now a slum near the waterfront docks, and one of the highlights of the film is a bar mitzvah ceremony set in Montevideo’s oldest shul. In some ways Reus is a standard gangster flick, but the acting is excellent and the interfamily dynamics have an intimate, lived-in quality that makes the inevitable deaths truly heart-breaking.

Click HERE to order tickets :-)

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April ’12 Spotlight

Posted on April 12, 2012 by

Nathan Englander came to the Harold Washington Library Center in February to read from What Do We Talk About When We Talk About Anne Frank, his latest collection of short stories. As the translator of New American Haggadah, Englander is actually promoting two books right now, and although they are outwardly very different, common threads soon became evident.

Over dinner at the Berghoff, I zeroed in on the story “Sister Hills.” Neighbors for decades, in war and at peace, two women who live side-by-side in a West Bank settlement make a solemn agreement in a moment of great fear. “More than anything that I’ve ever written, this book has really been a Rorschach Test,” said Englander. “I thought you might be headed there.” Yes he was schmoozing with a woman the same age as the characters in this story, but it turned out we had a deeper connection.

“My father’s yahrzeit was last week and the Torah reading was Mishpatim,” I said. “So questions of slavery and ownership are fresh on my mind.” “Mishpatim! That was my bar mitzvah parsha (portion)!” said Englander. “Writing is fraught. The process is crazy. But when I finished ‘Sister Hills,’ I did not sleep that night. I couldn’t. I was so rattled by it.”

Then he became speculative: “Something about doing the Haggadah project gave me the distance to look at my process anew and it allowed me to write more close…You’re making me think now of how memory is formed.”

In the midst of crafting new stories (“I’m going to tell the whole history of West Bank settlement in a single short story.”), Englander had gone back to the Hebrew text of our foundational story, and transformed the opening words of the Haggadah into these English words: “You are blessed, Lord God-of-Us, King of the Cosmos.” Now families all around the world will gather together this Passover and say these words, and this is how memories are formed.

Englander returns to Chicago on Thursday, April 26 to do an evening program—one of the iDays events—with Israeli author Etgar Keret at Chicago Sinai Congregation. For tickets, visit: www.ChicagoHumanities.org.

To read Mishpatim (Exodus 21:1 – 24:18) in the JPS Tanakh, visit www.jtsa.edu/PreBuilt/ParashahArchives/jpstext/mishpatim.shtml.

More Circle Games
Ellen Cassedy spoke about her new book We Are Here: Memories of the Lithuanian Holocaust at KAM Isaiah Israel in Hyde Park in March, and she is returning for a program sponsored by the Balzekas Museum of Lithuanian Culture (near Midway Airport) on Sunday, April 29.

We Are Here—the title of which is taken from the famous partisan resistance song—”Zog Nit Keyn Mol“-records Cassedy’s personal journey to Lithuania, juxtaposing the memories of relatives now living in America against the memories of Christians still living in and around Vilnius.

Although her mother’s Jewish family all fled Lithuania, Cassedy’s father’s family came from Ireland. Did her name, her complexion, and her red-gold hair help disarm people who might have been more guarded in face-to-face conversation with someone as Jewish-looking as I am?

Cassedy’s co-presenter on April 29 will be Ruta Sepetys, author of Between Shades of Gray, a highly-regarded novel about a Lithuanian family’s exile to Siberia during the Soviet era. For tickets, call (773) 582-6500, or visit the museum website: http://www.BalzekasMuseum.org.

To hear Chava Alberstein sing “Zog Nit Keyn Mol” in Yiddish, visit www.youtube.com/watch?v=-wgYnYSg3Zs&feature=related

Mazel Tov, Cyndee!
Cyndee Schaffer’s book Mollie’s War: The Letters of a WWII WAC in Europe just won first place in the 2012 Royal Dragonfly Contest in the Biography/Autobiography/Memoir category!

Schaffer has numerous public appearances planned for the spring, including Monday, April 23 at the next Chicago Jewish Authors Literary Series (hosted by Max and Benny’s Restaurant in Northbrook). For more details, visit the “Speaking Engagements” section of her website: www.MolliesWar.com.

Read more about Mollie’s War in my February ’11 column: http://SecondCityTzivi.com/2011/03/30/feb-11-spotlight/.

Chicago Latino Film Festival
This year the 28th annual CLFF brings us Reus from Uruguay. Barrio Reus is the name of a Jewish enclave in Montevideo, now a slum near the waterfront docks, and one of the highlights of the film is a bar mitzvah ceremony set in Montevideo’s oldest shul. In some ways Reus is a standard gangster flick, but the acting is excellent and the interfamily dynamics have an intimate, lived-in quality that makes the inevitable deaths truly heart-breaking. To order tickets, visit: http://ChicagoLatinoFilmFestival.org/

Jan Lisa Huttner (Tzivi) is an award-winning Chicago critic/columnist. Visit Jan’s blog, www.SecondCityTzivi.com, for a complete online archive of all JUF News columns and posts plus additional interviews and reviews. Send comments and/or suggestions for future columns to Tzivi@msn.com.

Posted: 3/28/2012 11:26:14 AM

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