Mandell JCC presents
“A Reel Jewish Celebration’ 

WEST HARTFORD-The 11th Annual Hartford Jewish Film Festival will present a slate of 18 internationally acclaimed feature films, documentaries, short subjects and biographies March 10 - 18, including several Connecticut movie premieres.  Presented by the Mandell JCC with the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art and Trinity College in five Greater Hartford venues, the Festival showcases new releases and Jewish-themed films from Canada, Germany, Israel and the United States.
The Festival launches Saturday, March 10 at the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art with the Connecticut premiere of “Three Mothers,” the award-winning Israeli saga of three beautiful triplets born to a wealthy Jewish family in Egypt, who now live in Israel. Their web of tender secrets and family deceptions play out across three generations. Director Dina Zvi - Riklis is scheduled to attend the Opening Night reception and discuss her film, which introduces Israel’s hottest new musical talent Miri Masika. 
“Ira and Abby,” starring and produced by Guilford native and Tony nominee Jennifer Westfeldt (“Kissing Jessica Stein”) is a ‘romantic divorce comedy’ set in New York City. 
Israeli politics, ethnic cross-currents and Israel’s diverse immigrant cultures provide plot lines for several award-winning entries.  A middle-class Israeli teacher and combat veteran leaves home for Paris, but disappears into the shadowy immigrant back alleys of Tel Aviv in “Janem, Janem.” The surprising and poignant “39 Pounds of Love” follows Israeli medical miracle Ami Ankilewitz on a humorous and inspiring Harley Davidson road trip across the United States in search of answers from the past. “Paper Dolls” reveals the secret lives of transgender Filipinos working in Israel as elderly caregivers by day, and performing as drag queens at night.  Expect to be at the edge of your seat watching “Dark Night,” when two Israeli soldiers are trapped inside a Palestinian home with their hostages, who have surprises of their own.  A meddling mom, a shy beauty and an unemployed Argentinian immigrant actor find true love in the hilarious “Like A Fish Out Of Water.”     
                                                                                                               Five films in the line-up treat the Holocaust, World War II and Nazism in unusual ways.  A liberal Jewish attorney and son of concentration camp survivors defends a neo-Nazi skinhead accused of a racially motivated murder in the powerful new Canadian film “Steel Toes,” premiering at the Festival.  “Sophie Scholl:  The Final Days” is the true story of Germany’s most famous anti-Nazi heroine, her brother and their courageous student friends. “Nowhere in Africa,” the visually stunning 2002 Academy Award winner brings to the screen the Relich family’s escape from Nazi Germany to Kenya. 
Fred Howard of New York was an unlikely war hero when he and a group of young German Jewish refugees were recruited by the United States Army for special military intelligence operations. Now retired from a successful business career, Howard is scheduled to introduce “The Ritchie Boys,” an appealing documentary filmed at the group’s recent reunion decades after the war.  
”The World Was Ours: The Jewish Legacy of Vilna,” is a tribute to the “Jerusalem of Lithuania” and Vilna’s Jews who vanished in World War II. Film Producer/Director Mira Jedwabnik Van Doren and Trinity College Professor Sam Kassow, one of the experts featured in the film, will speak following the film.
Several delightful and quirky short subjects add variety to the slate. “A Kiss Is A Kiss Is A Kiss” challenges Israeli couples candid camera-style.  A single American Jewish woman, encouraged by her marriage-minded mother, debates the merits of plastic surgery in “My Nose.”  Take a musical trip around Jerusalem with “The Red Toy.”  “The Tribe” is a tongue-in-cheek visual treat about Jewish identity as seen through the fantasy life of Barbie, the world’s most popular doll.
The contributions of two Jewish cultural arts giants will be featured in films and a live musical performance.  “Arthur Szyk: Soldier in Art” is a glimpse into this illustrator’s work and his social commentary. “American Masters-Leonard Bernstein: Reaching for the Note” won 17 Emmy awards, an Oscar and Grammy statues for showcasing the legendary career of Leonard Bernstein in this intriguing documentary, shown courtesy Thirteen/WNET New York. ”A Musical Tribute to Leonard Bernstein” featuring opera mezzo soprano Elizabeth Shammash and tenor Hazzan Brian Baruch Shamash live in concert will precede this film at 3:30 p.m.  on the Festival’s closing day, Sunday, March 18. 
   


For tickets, more information, directions, and a Film Festival brochure, contact the Festival Box Office, Mandell JCC, Zachs Campus,  335 Bloomfield Ave., West Hartford, CT. 06117,  860 -231-6316 or visit the official film festival website, www.hjff.org.