DocOlim film fest focuses on modern Israeli immigrant experience
Event hosted by DocAviv opens October 7 in Tel Aviv Cinematheque
Jessica Steinberg, The Times of Israel's culture and lifestyles editor, covers the Sabra scene from south to north and back to the center
Tel Aviv’s DocAviv is hosting DocOlim, six screenings about the Israeli immigrant experience, October 7-14, in honor of Aliyah Week 2021.
The DocOlim films will be screened at Tel Aviv community centers, with opening night on October 7 at the Tel Aviv Cinematheque, when the 2016 film “Babylon Dreamers,” about breakdancers from a poor Ashdod neighborhood will be shown, followed by a live performance.
The six films portray the various struggles and successes of immigrants to Israel from the former Soviet Union, Argentina, England, Ethiopia and France. The event is sponsored by the Tel Aviv municipality and the Aliyah and Immigrant Absorption Ministry.
The other featured films include Reuven Brodsky’s 2012 film, “Home Movie,” about Russian immigrants and their apartment that keeps them together; “With No Land,” (2021) about Ethiopian activists, 30 years after Operation Solomon; and the 2010 film “Just Like the Queen of England,” about French Holocaust survivor David Bergman.
In “The Bentwich Syndrome,” director Gur Bentwich tells the saga of his Anglo-Jewish family, while “Violeta Mi Vida” is Or Sinai’s 2012 film about immigrants from Argentina grappling with immigrant hardships.
Most of the screenings will be followed by a question-and-answer session with the directors.
