Maine Jewish Film Festival 2010 Schedule

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Saturday, March 20

6:00 PM Opening Night Party

Greenhut Galleries / 146 Middle Street / Portland
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Join us for appetizers and drinks.

8:00 PM Ajami

Nickelodeon Cinemas / 1 Temple Street / Portland
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A gritty, urban crime drama brimming with raw energy and razor sharp insights, Ajami tells the interwoven stories of Jewish, Muslim and Christian neighbors often living in violence and disharmony in an impoverished Jaffa, Israel neighborhood.

Adult themes and content

Sunday, March 21

1:00 PM Hey, Hey It’s Esther Blueburger

Nickelodeon Cinemas / 1 Temple Street / Portland
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Esther Blueberger is a unique misfit in an elite girls school. She is also gutsy, opinionated and refreshingly determined to be true to her own ideals rather than conform. Any schoolgirl whose best friend is a duck she rescued from the school laboratory and named ‘Normal’ is likely to find life difficult in her teenage years.

Mature themes

Free Youth Film

Nickelodeon Cinemas / 1 Temple Street / Portland
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Children under 18 admitted free. All seats require a ticket

4:00 PM Inside Hana’s Suitcase

Inside Hana’s Suitcase tells the present-day story of a group of Japanese children who, with the help of their passionate and tenacious teacher, Fumiko Ishioka, are able to solve the mystery of a young Czech girl, Hana Brady, whose name appears on an old battered suitcase in the Auschwitz Museum.

6:00 PM A Matter of Size

Nickelodeon Cinemas / 1 Temple Street / Portland
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A Matter of Size is an absolutely enjoyable film. Herzl (Itzik Cohen) is and always has been overweight. Newly unemployed, living at home with his mother in Ramla and banished from his weight-loss program, he finds himself washing dishes in a Japanese restaurant. There, he is introduced to sumo wrestling.

Adult themes and sexual content

Woman Filmmaker Forum

Nickelodeon Cinemas / 1 Temple Street / Portland
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8:00 PM William Kunstler: Disturbing the Universe

In William Kunstler: Disturbing The Universe, filmmakers Emily Kunstler and Sarah Kunstler explore the life of their father, the late radical civil rights lawyer. In the 1960s and 70s, William Kunstler fought for civil rights with Martin Luther King Jr. and represented the famed “Chicago 8” activists who protested the Vietnam War.

In person: Directors Emily Kunstler and Sarah Kunstler

Monday, March 22

5:00 PM The Debt

Nickelodeon Cinemas / 1 Temple Street / Portland
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Forty years after the supposed capture of the fictional Nazi war criminal known as “The Surgeon of Birkenau,” two ex-Mossad agents are alerted that he may still be alive...

5:30-6:30 PM Behind the scenes: a conversation with independent filmmaker and director Erik Kesten

Salt Institute for Documentary Studies / 561 Congress Street / Portland
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Don’t miss this opportunity to hear what it takes to create an award-winning documentary and be part of an intimate conversation with the director of Holy Land Hardball (2009). This event is free and open to the public. Make sure to purchase a ticket for the 7:00 PM screening of the film!

7:00 PM Holy Land Hardball

Nickelodeon Cinemas / 1 Temple Street / Portland
Map

Meet Larry Baras, a middle-aged Jewish bakery owner from Boston. With no prior sports management experience, he sets out to create Israel’s first professional baseball league. With extraordinary access, Holy Land Hardball follows the unlikely formation of the Israel Baseball League, the first ever professional baseball circuit in the Middle East.

In person: Director Erik Kesten along with two ball players who appear in the film -

Alexenberg, pitcher for the Petach Tikva Pioneers and Jim Pierce, infielder for the Bet Shemesh Blue Sox

Tuesday, March 23

Seniors Free Luncheon & Matinee

Maine Historical Society / 489 Congress Street / Portland
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12:00 PM Free Luncheon

Luncheon limited to first 60 seniors 65 years and older who reserve

Call 207.831.7495 to secure a reservation

1:00 PM Everybody’s Uncle Sam:
The Life and Legacy of Sam L. Cohen

A lively portrayal of the Biddeford man whose legacy benefits the people of southern Maine. The influences of Sam’s hometown, his parents, and the Jewish community are explored from the turn of the 20th century until his death in 2003.

1:30 PM The Debt

Forty years after the supposed capture of the fictional Nazi war criminal known as “The Surgeon of Birkenau,” two ex-Mossad agents are alerted that he may still be alive...

Screening free for patrons 65 and older. General audience welcome at regular ticket prices. All seats require a ticket.

5:00 PM Zrubavel shown w/ Maine filmmaker shorts

Nickelodeon Cinemas / 1 Temple Street / Portland
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Mustard Doublebreasted

As the 40th anniversary of his bar mitzvah approaches, a son and his parents recall the experience

More information

The Bat Mitzvah Gift

A mother’s yearlong search for the perfect present to give her daughter on her 13th birthday.

Zrubravel

The first Israeli film by a team of Ethiopian Israelis. Itzhak, soon to be a bar mitzvah, dreams of becoming the Spike Lee of Israel and films a documentary about the neighborhood’s residents. He comes from an Ethiopian immigrant family led by his grandfather. A janitor, Gita insists on sending his son to a pretentious school despite the principal’s refusal to accept the boy.

5:30-6:30 PM LGBT Film Forum Reception

Salt Institute for Documentary Studies / 561 Congress Street / Portland
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MJFF and Salt Institute for Documentary Studies invite you to a reception prior to the screening of The Secrets. Come celebrate the GLBT Film Forum! Join us for appetizers, drinks and good company.

This event is limited to The Secrets ticket holders

Tickets available at the door

LGBT Film Forum

Nickelodeon Cinemas / 1 Temple Street / Portland
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7:00 PM The Secrets

Transport two young women to a seminary in the holy city of Safed, throw in a murder mystery, a French cinema legend, a klezmer-playing pharmacist and a lesbian love story and you’ve got The Secrets – the astonishing new Orthodox-feminist feature from Israeli maverick Avi Nesher. Devout Naomi (Ania Bokstein) dreams of becoming the first female rabbi and quickly establishes herself as the seminary boffin, to the annoyance of cosmopolitan Michelle (Michal Shtamler), who arrives from France moodily chain-smoking.

Adult themes and sexual content

Wednesday, March 24

5:00 PM The Strangers

Nickelodeon Cinemas / 1 Temple Street / Portland
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He’s Israeli, she’s Palestinian. They meet in Berlin during the frenzy of the World Cup finals where relief at running into somebody from “home” quickly turns to desire. Can love trump politics?

7:00 PM Canvasman

Nickelodeon Cinemas / 1 Temple Street / Portland
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Canvasman, directed by Portland native, Gary Robinov, chronicles the dual lives of Rob Elowitch, art collector and owner of the prestigious Barridoff Galleries, who for the last forty years has also wrestled professionally under the “mat name” Robbie Ellis.

In Person: Director, Gary Robinov and star, Rob Elowitch

9:00 PM Artist Reception - Canvasman

Salt Institute for Documentary Studies / 561 Congress Street / Portland
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MJFF invites you to our reception to celebrate the premiere event of Canvasman. Come mingle with director and Portland resident Gary Robinov, as well as Rob Elowitch, star of Canvasman. Appetizers and drinks provided.

This event is limited to Canvasman ticket holders. Please keep your ticket stub for admittance

7:00 PM A Matter of Size

Olin Arts Center / Bates College / Lewiston, Maine
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A Matter of Size is an absolutely enjoyable film. Herzl (Itzik Cohen) is and always has been overweight. Newly unemployed, living at home with his mother in Ramla and banished from his weight-loss program, he finds himself washing dishes in a Japanese restaurant. There, he is introduced to sumo wrestling.

Adult themes and sexual content

Thursday, March 25

2:00 PM HAG

Nickelodeon Cinemas / 1 Temple Street / Portland
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HAG is a serio-comic hybrid of fact and fiction chronicling the life of Yisrael “Izzi” Lifschutz. He has acted in and/or consulted on such Hollywood films as The Chosen, Stranger Among Us and the independent classic Pi (which he also co-produced). This outrageously funny mockumentary is a survey of Jewish visibility in cinema and fictionalized history with archival “behind the scenes” footage, interviews, and staged scenes.

In person: Director, Yisrael Lifshutz

5:00 PM Noodle

Nickelodeon Cinemas / 1 Temple Street / Portland
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At 37, Miri is a twice-widowed, El Al flight attendant. Her well-regulated existence is suddenly turned upside down by an abandoned Chinese boy whose migrant-worker mother has been summarily deported from Israel.

7:00 PM Leaving the Fold

Nickelodeon Cinemas / 1 Temple Street / Portland
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Leaving The Fold is a documentary, 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.

In person: Director, Eric Scott