Celebrating Film and Culture

A two-day Jewish Film Festival will go underway this weekend at the University Theater. The event, which is co-sponsored by a number of Jewish cultural groups in the Long Beach community along with the school’s Jewish Studies Program, does not have a theme, but will focus on films of intimate personal dramas.

The line-up includes a range of independent films that are otherwise hard to miss, commented the festival organizer Jeffrey Blutinger, who is also the co-director of Cal State Long Beach’s Jewish Studies Program. The films have more to do with dynamic family relationships and have “very little engagement with politics,” he said.



This is the third year the Jewish Film Festival returns to CSULB by popular demand, Blutinger said. “These are terrific films. This is a chance for community, faculty and students to see modern Jewish life in vibrant and exciting ways.”

The first film, “Three Mothers,” will show Saturday evening at 7. The film is about Egyptian-Jewish triplet sisters who are in the midst of beginning their new lives in a modern Israel society.

“Souvenirs,” “Sweet Mud,” and Paul Verhoeven’s “Black Book” will conclude the festival on Sunday; the films will screen at 10a.m., 2p.m. and 6p.m., respectively.

Admission is $10 to attend an individual film or $36 for a festival pass to all the films.

The Considered Connoisseur of the moment said...
“Exploring the world through the eyes of another, especially in this medium, is invaluable. This film festival will offer me a cinematic look into part of my own heritage.” (Said Melissa Tanney, the Arts Commissioner for ASI, of the festival.)

Flyer images courtesy of Jeffrey Blutinger, from the CSULB Jewish Studies Program.