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Filtered By: Spanish Clear All

In this sharp Argentine romantic comedy, Uriel is a dedicated single dad by day and a Jewish Don Juan at night. When Uriel runs into an old girlfriend who dumped him years ago, he is hooked. Daniel Burman, one of Argentina’s leading directors, brilliantly cast the Uruguayan Oscar-winning singer/songwriter Jorge Drexler to play Uriel alongside sexy actress Valeria Bertuccelli. Watch the sparks fly!

Anita, a young Jewish woman with Down syndrome, lives with her devoted mother above the shop her late father started in a commercial district of Buenos Aires. Into their sweetly sedate domestic life the outside world intrudes with unexpected fury. But as Anita wanders the city lost, she finds compassion in unlikely quarters through the simple force of her ingenuous personality and open heart. Wrenching, lovely, suffused with life, Anita is a profoundly hopeful study of human innocence, compassion and resilience in a fragile, troubled world.

Víctor Tellez is jaded, emotionally repressed and arrogant. Not surprisingly, he is an influential but harsh film critic for a daily newspaper. Victor especially detests Hollywood romantic comedies until he meets Sofía, a spontaneous and vibrant woman. He finds himself going soft, and his movie reviews reflect this. El Critico is intelligent, funny, delightful and ultimately succumbs to the genre Víctor so derisively abhors. Love conquers all, even this cynical snob.

When Rebecca, an American, ditches her fiancé in Israel, she finds solace with tough, pragmatic Hanna, a Russian-Israeli limo driver. Hanna is headed for the "free zone" in Jordan to pick up money owed to her husband. There, they cross paths with Leila, a Palestinian businesswoman, and the three women form an inextricable bond despite their disparate backgrounds and views. A film about borders and terrain, both political and psychological.

Buenos Aires, 1994. Ahmed, a committed Muslim martyr, works as a successful young surgeon. But his destiny, when the inevitable day arrives, is to carry out an attack for radical Islam. Meanwhile, David, a cold-blooded Mossad agent, awaits the opportunity to exact some very personal revenge. This pulse-pounding thriller pits two determined men against each other in the aftermath of the deadly real-life bombings in Buenos Aries against the Jewish community.

Flamenco, the Gypsy-, Jewish-, Arab- and Andalusian-inspired art form, is loved around the world. But what happens when a white boy with Alabama roots falls in love with flamenco and becomes a renowned flamenco guitarist? Gypsy Davy tells the story of David Jones aka David Serva from the perspective of the five women in his life and his children—one of them, the filmmaker, who was abandoned by the musician when she was a year old. With searing honesty and wry humor, Serva’s daughter Rachel unravels a series of tangled lives and forges new possibilities. [MINIGUIDE 94/100]

On the outside, Harley is a confident and brash criminal defense attorney, who relishes taking the side of the underdog . On the inside, this middle-aged Jewish man living with his mother is still deeply scarred by the bully who antagonized him in high school. Harley, despite his erraticness and eccentricity, remains a man with a generous heart in this unique portrait of a true larger-than-life character.

Havana Curveball

Havana Curveball

What does it mean to become a man on the occasion of your bar mitzvah? Bay Area filmmakers Marcia Jarmel and Ken Schneider (Return of Sarah’s Daughters, SFJFF 1997) follow their thirteen-year-old Mica as he struggles to make good on his commitment to deliver baseball equipment to kids in Cuba. Eventually, he gets to play ball in Cuba as well as experience the satisfactions and disappointments associated with being a benefactor to those less fortunate. preceded by Some vacation.[

About This Film

A cantankerous 88-year-old has waited to fulfill a promise to a friend who helped him escape the Holocaust.

A young Jewish woman from Mexico City finds herself torn between her family and her forbidden love with a non-Jewish man.

Jacob Kaplan has built a happy life in Uruguay after fleeing from Poland during World War II. But at 76 his health falters, and he fears that he is a failure. He rashly concocts a scheme to kidnap a man he’s convinced is a Nazi and ship him to Israel to stand trial. His bungled, Wiesenthal-esque quest not only makes for scenic viewing, it yields a genuinely surprising resolution.

Ariel lives in New York, far from the lively Jewish district in Buenos Aires where he grew up. But when his father summons him back home for help, Ariel reluctantly returns. The Tenth Man is a kindhearted comedy with a gentle romantic touch. Director Daniel Burman (All In, SFJFF 2012) joyfully upends the old adage that you can never go home again and instead says, maybe under the right circumstances, you can. —Jay Rosenblatt

The heroine of this documentary, Rebecca Gomperts, embodies tikkun olam, repairing the world through your actions. The founder of Women on Waves, Gomperts builds a floating clinic to offer abortions where the procedure is banned, but her maiden voyage ends in disaster. She changes strategy, exploiting loopholes to teach women a World Health Organization–endorsed protocol to give themselves abortions at home. Her ingeniousness makes for a surprisingly invigorating tale.

Watchers of the Sky

Watchers of the Sky

About This Film

This masterful drama tells the story of two Jewish Uruguayan brothers. Jacobo lives alone in Montevideo, attached to his antiquated sock factory and the comfort of his routine. When Herman returns to Uruguay for the first time in 20 years, Jacobo asks his long-tenured employee Marta to pretend to be his wife. The three embark on a weekend vacation together, where relationships unfold and jealousies threaten to extinguish any sparks of brotherly love.

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