Hong Kong Jewish Film Festival

EVENT DESCRIPTION

The 23rd Annual Hong Kong Jewish Film Festival opens in cinemas in November with an award-winning lineup of world-class Jewish films. The Festival will screen 23 feature films and documentaries over eight days beginning Saturday, November 12 through Sunday November 20.

To reach a wider audience of film lovers this year, the Festival will spread out across Hong Kong. The majority of films will be screened at Golden Scene Cinema in Kennedy Town, with Opening Night on November 12th at MCL Cyberport Cinema. A special evening screening will be held at K11 Art House in Tsim Sha Tsui on November 17th.

The Festival kicks off this year with Adieu Monsieur Haffman, starring the legendary Daniel Auteuil and directed by Fred Cavayé. This tense historical drama, set in occupied Paris in 1941, is based on Jean-Philippe Daguerre’s celebrated, award-winning play about a jeweller who is forced to seek his assistant’s protection.

The Festival features numerous Asian premieres, including the hit Israeli comedy-drama Karaoke, about an older couple whose life is changed by their charismatic new neighbor.

Featuring a host of renowned Israeli actors including Lior Ashkenazi, the film premiered at New York’s TriBeCa Film Festival and won the 2022 Audience Award at the Jerusalem Film Festival as well as Best Actor (Sasson Gabbay) and Actress (Rita Shukrun) at the 2022 Ophir Awards (Israel’s Academy Awards).

Another Asian premiere is Cinema Sabaya which swept the 2022 Ophir Awards notably winning Best Film, Best Director (Orit Fouks Rotem), Best Supporting Actress, Best Casting, and Best Costume Design. This film takes a joyous look at a video workshop for a group of female Jewish and Arab municipality workers led by Rona (Dana Ivgy), a young filmmaker, that has a feeling of real authenticity. It explores the bonds that form among the women, how traumas surface and how the workshop encourages them to try to fulfill their dreams.

Additionally, the beautifully filmed Israeli documentary, Dead Sea Guardians, winner of multiple awards, is making its Asian premiere. An Israeli, a Palestinian, and a Jordanian organize a mass long-distance swim across the Dead Sea to raise international awareness about environmental issues that are destroying this historically significant body of water.

A highlight of this year’s Festival is Three Minutes: A Lengthening. This remarkable documentary focuses on three minutes of footage filmed by an American tourist in Poland in 1938, the only pre-Holocaust moving images remaining of the Jewish inhabitants of Nasielsk. The film serves as a devastating memorial tribute to lives long lost and a haunting essay on history and memory.

The majority of films will be presented in English or with English subtitles, and two features will also have Chinese subtitles: French comedy-drama, The Specials (Hors Normes), nominated for Best Actor, Best Film, and Best Original Screenplay at the Cesar Awards in France, and the animated feature, Where is Anne Frank?, winner of the School Jury Award at the Luxembourg City Film Festival.

Tickets are now available for purchase at hkjff.org.

ABOUT THE ARTIST / ORGANISER

The Hong Kong Jewish Film Festival is Asia’s flagship festival featuring the best Jewish-themed films from around the world. Since it was founded in 2000, the Festival has screened hundreds of features, documentaries and short films from over 30 countries, hosting directors, producers, critics and curators.