The Temple Invites Community to Celebrate Yom HaAtzmaut with Three Israeli Films

The community is invited to celebrate Yom HaAtzmaut, Israel’s Independence Day, at The Temple on Saturday, May 14, at 7 p.m. The program will feature two award-winning films from the Ma’aleh School of Television, Film and the Arts in Jerusalem, to be shown in the Waller Chapel, and will be followed by a light traditional Israeli dinner of falafel, hummus and salad.

“A Shabbos Mother” was the winner of the 2005 Jewish Film Festival in Jerusalem and captured the Best Female Film award in the Religion Today Film Festival in Trento, Italy, the same year. It is the story of three sisters – a radio broadcaster who has abandoned her traditional roots, a religious woman in her ninth month of pregnancy and the film’s heroine, who is struggling to conceive a child – who gather at their widowed mother’s house for Shabbat.

“Cohen’s Wife” took second prize in the 2001 Students Film Festival in Potsdam, Germany; the Best Short Film in the 2002 Religion Today Film Festival in Trento, Italy, and the Audience Favorite Prize in 2003 in Westchester, USA. After being raped by a stranger, a young ultra-orthodox woman awaits a Rabbinical decision about whether or not her husband should divorce her. Jewish law states that “if the wife of a Cohen (descendent of a priest) is raped, she is forbidden to her husband.” “Cohen’s Wife” is a provocative modern-day portrait of a couple torn between religious law and marital devotion.

The Ma’aleh School is the only film school of its kind in the world. Founded in 1989, it is an institution of higher education, which trains filmmakers to produce work inspired by their Jewish heritage, fostering a unique connection between the world of media and Jewish culture. The school aims to build bridges between Jewish tradition and social experience as well as between the religious and secular worlds.

During this year’s Louisville Jewish Film Festival, the Jewish Community of Louisville introduced nearly 200 people to the school’s work, as three short films produced by students in the school were included in the February event.

This event is sponsored by a Jewish Hospital HealthCare Services Louisville Jewish Community Excellence Grant, the Louisville Jewish Film Festival, the World Zionist Organization Department for Zionist Activities  and the Hertzl Center.

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