Films about Mizrahi (MENA) Jews
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- DirectorPhilippe BellaicheJews of Marrakech now and then. 6 short documentary films. Co-production Project Initiators: Taha Balafrej. connect Institute, Morocco/ Prof. Sami Shalom Chetrit Sapir College, Israel.
- DirectorZohar WagnerStarsDana IvgyAla DakkaImri BitonKochava Levi, a 31-year-old housewife of Yemeni descent, was taken hostage during an attack on the Savoy hotel in Tel Aviv (March 1975). Over the course of one night, she transformed herself into a fearless heroine. However, by dawn, she was left with nothing but shame.
- DirectorIris ZakiStarsSouad ZakiEzat Abu-JabalRivka BaharDirector Iris Zaki embarks on an intimate journey with her father, exploring the extraordinary story of her legendary, Egyptian singer grandmother: Souad Zaki, in a hybrid cinematic project that crosses nations, cultures and religions
- DirectorMorris Ben-MayorKobi FaragStarsShoshana DamariMati CaspiIdan ReichelShoshana Damari was the first Israeli diva. She graced local and international stages, stirring millions with her beguiling voice and spectacular performance. Yet behind the larger-than-life persona and her memorable songs was a woman about whom we know little. She didn't like to be interviewed and never volunteered details about herself and her family. Hers was the life of a Hollywood legend and she paid the price for it. This is a story about fame and loneliness, acclaim and loss, daring and compromise. For the first time, the woman behind the crown, the cloak and the palace will come to light.
- DirectorShlomo VazanaStarsNino BittonNino Bitton is a known Master of Andalusian music among musicians. While most Maghreb and Jewish-Arab musicians in Israel were unfortunately forgotten, Nino managed, against all odds, to be an off-grid active musician and even pass on his legacy.
- DirectorIsraela Shaer-MeodedStarsLea AvrahamAdi KeissarVery few details are known about Rabbi Shalom Shabazi, but 400 years after his death, Shabazi is as popular as ever and is considered one of the greatest Yemenite poets. The film takes the audience on a journey through the extraordinary life of one of the greatest Hebrew writers.
- DirectorFiona MurphyRemember Baghdad is the untold story of Iraq, an unmissable insight into how the country developed through the eyes of the Jews, Iraq's first wave of refugees. From picnics on the Tigris and royal balls, to hangings, imprisonment and escape, moving individual stories take us from past to present unfolding onto the wider story of the Middle East. The consequences of the little-known Nazi influence, the self-serving monarchy imposed by the British, and of Israel are played out in their lives. After 2,600 years living peacefully in the area, in one generation the community vanishes. With vivid testimony, home movies and news archive, as well as footage from Iraq today, we follow the lives of four families trying to make sense of turbulent times, and one man goes back to buy a house in Iraq. His dream is to plant a seed of hope. Remember Baghdad is history made personal, revealing the little-known but fascinating back story of how the disintegration began in a country that has exploded into our lives today.
- DirectorKobi FaragGripping and moving real life story of the first Iraqi-Jewish family to become a household name in Israel. Emigrating to Israel from Baghdad in the 1950s, the Farag family built a hugely successful photography business which revolutionized the way Israelis took, developed and related to pictures. Kobi Farag, a scion of the famous photographer clan, traces the story of the ten brothers and sisters, who despite their amazing professional achievements failed to protect the family from a painful process of disintegration. Based on fascinating interviews and archival materials, Photo Farag explores the often destructive forces of a family determined to leave its mark on Israeli society. Tel Aviv, on the corner of Dizengoff and Arlozorov. Every day many Israelis walk by the photo shop that was once glorious and remains engraved in the collective memory as the epitome of family and wedding photos, but few know the story behind it. Member of the youngest generation of the Farag family, director Kobi Farag went on a journey to discover the family history. By digging in the private archives,he peeled layer by layer to reveal the story of ten brothers and sisters who immigrated from Baghdad in the fifties and climbed the ladder of success from their lives in the transition camp to a luxurious home. In his own way, he tries to solve the riddle of the painful disintegration of the family that drifted apart.
- DirectorDuki DrorGalia DrorA young Iraqi journalist sets out to write about Linda Abdul Aziz, who escaped to Israel in the early 70's and whose father, a prominent lawyer, had been kidnapped in Baghdad. The continuous dialog between the two, slowly uncovers the tragic end of her father, as well as that of a whole Jewish community that thrived in Iraq for over 2000 year.
- DirectorGoldberg AyalStarsRitaRita Jahan Foruz, world famous singer, immigrated to Israel from Iran with her family as a young child. 40 years later, with enormous tension between Tehran and Jerusalem looming in the background, she records her first album in Farsi.
- DirectorNissim DayanStarsDaniel GadYasmin AyunTawfeek BarhomBetween the years 1950-51 close to 130 thousand Jews left Iraq. The most ancient community in the world ceased to exist.
- DirectorYitzhak HalutziStarsVicki ShiranVicki Shiran's story represents the story of the rise, and some say the fall, of the social struggle for equality that characterized Israel in the past forty years.
- DirectorDan ShadurStarsErvand AbrahamianShaul BakhashZahra EshraghiA documentary thriller describing the last days of the Israeli community in Tehran, on the eve of the Islamic Revolution in 1979. The director, whose family was in Tehran at the time, uses rare archive materials to illustrate how thousands of Israelis, who enjoyed unusual affinity with the Shah's regime, wake up one morning to find their paradise vanished.
- DirectorNitzan GiladyThe film observes an Israeli family of Yemenite descent on their transformative trip to the Grand Canyon. The trip across the desert in a small RV discloses the fractures and varying prospective among the family members. It centers on the conservative father, who's worried about his youngest son, who suffers from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder and his middle son, who emigrated from the country years ago; he also refuses to accept the fact that his eldest son is gay. 'Family Time' is a universal story, with children trying to find self-fulfillment versus their parents' dreams and hopes.
- DirectorGili GaonStarsDudu TassaYair DalalSalah and Daud Al-kweiti, Jewish musicians in Iraq in the 1930's, are considered the creators of modern Iraqi music, and two of the greatest Arab musicians in history. In the 1950's they immigrated to Israel, where no one paid attention to their music. They forbid their family members to become musicians lest they experience the same pain. Despite this, Daud's grandson, Dudu Tassa is a leading performer in today's Israeli Rock n' Roll scene. Releasing an album which features the original music of the Al-kweitis in modern style, Dudu attempts to bridge time, space and culture, healing the family's pain.
- DirectorEffi BanayThe journey of a man into the depths of his past and into the roots of his yearning for a place which was and is no more.
- DirectorEinat KapachYosef and Bracha married when they were 12 in Sana'a, Yemen and lived together for close to 70 years. Yosef became absorbed in his books, while Bracha took care of the needy. Before he dies, Rabbi Yosef Kapach hands his granddaughter Einat, director of the film, a bundle of pages which uncover a secret he has kept close to his heart his entire life: the secret of the theological war that split the Yemenite Jewish community. The documents tell of his persecution as a young orphan by the Jews of Yemen, a persecution that continues until the day he dies in Israel. Having read these words, Einat sets out to understand why he chose her to pass on the legacy and how he managed to turn his life around from such a lonely point and become a world-famous Jewish philosopher.
- DirectorSigalit BanaiThe film depicts the establishment of the town of Sderot from the viewpoint of its first settlers - immigrants who were transported on trucks in the middle of the night to a desolate "ma'bara" (transit camp) somewhere in the desert. Despite the many challenges they faced, they stayed and developed an Israeli town with a unique character.
- DirectorSarit HaymianThe film follows two elderly Jewish women who immigrated from Iran to Israel 50 years ago and live in a slum.After serving a husband, surrounded with her children and grandchildren, they are trying to fulfilled their dreams.
- DirectorMichael GrynszpanMizrahi Jews remember their lives in Arab countries, their expulsion, and their coming to Israel.
- DirectorNissim MossekIn the 1970s, a new protest movement burst into Israeli politics. Calling themselves the Black Panthers, this group of rebellious young Mizrahi men was intensely critical of racism and class bias within the Israeli establishment. They embraced Robin Hood-like campaigns such as "Operation Milk," which stole food from rich areas in Jerusalem and distributed it to impoverished immigrants. Their bold moves captured the attention of the young and disenfranchised while earning the animosity of others (Golda Meir called them barbarians). Thirty years ago, as a novice filmmaker, Nissim Mossek set out to document the Panthers' burgeoning movement, following their demonstrations and ferocious confrontations with police. He and the Panthers had no compunctions about waking up families in the middle of the night to ask them to "present their poverty" to the camera, hoping to inform the public about the struggle for equality within Israeli society and incite others to action. Mossek's 1970s protest film vanished suspiciously just after completion; for years it was believed to be lost. The recent discovery of a copy in the Jerusalem Cinematheque prompted the filmmaker to investigate the demise of the Panthers. He tracked down surviving members to examine their sometimes surprising trajectories and their deeply conflicted relationships to their shared radical past. Intercutting footage from his early film with his modern-day research, the diverse, volatile and charismatic subjects (including Panthers Charlie Bitton and Sa'adia Marciano) cast light onto a lesser-known chapter in the struggle for equality and justice of Mizrahi Jews, and illuminate issues of disunity that continue to reveal themselves in today's Israel.
- DirectorRami KimchiThe life story of Henriette Ezer, Egyptian-born the director's mother, and is a parable of the complex relationship between East Jewry and Israel. The film combines excerpts from the classic Egyptian film 'Leila, the Girl from the Country'.
- DirectorErez LauferStarsZahava BenA view of middle east politics through the life and performances of Zehava Ben. The Moroccan-born Israeli musician captured the hearts of audiences Gaza, Jericho, and elsewhere throughout the Arab world.
- DirectorAmos GitaiIn 1959, North African Jews rebelled against the Labour Party, which treated them as inferiors. There were disturbances throughout the country. In Wadi Salib, in the Haifa Valley, rebels set fire to a whole part of the neighborhood. The army surrounded the Wadi and destroyed it. Twenty years later, Amos Gitai interviewed the actors and witnesses.