Sam Spiegel film school incubator celebrates first decade
The Jerusalem film school lab marks 10 years of teaching budding filmmakers
Jessica Steinberg, The Times of Israel's culture and lifestyles editor, covers the Sabra scene from south to north and back to the center
In honor of the tenth anniversary of the Sam Spiegel international film lab, the Jerusalem-based school spent two days screening its graduates’ films and hosting panels about movies and filmmaking at its new Jerusalem campus.
The Lab celebration featured screenings of 10 movies, one for each of its 10 years, made by graduates of the Film Lab, which admits six Israeli participants and six international participants each year.
Some 114 movies have been made in the last decade by filmmakers from 45 countries, and 45 have been produced and released.
Three-quarters of those films have been shown at well-known film festivals such as Cannes and Berlin, and an Oscar was awarded to Lazlo Nemes’s 2016 Holocaust drama, “Son of Saul.”
That film was screened, along with award-winning Israeli films “Cinema Sabaya” by Orit Fouks Rotem and “Fig Tree” by Alamork Davidian.
Wednesday night’s panel on film development was hosted by Lab director Mor Eldar, along with director Avi Nesher, producer Marek Rozenbaum, and Lab graduates Fouks Rotem and Aleeza Chanowitz, creator of HOT television series “Chanshi.”
Renowned Israeli director Nesher, who has worked as a mentor with the Lab students and whose daughter studied at the film school and its lab, said that one of his greatest joys is discovering interesting work by young filmmakers.
He also said that screenwriting is far more difficult than directing.
“I write about what bothers me,” said Nesher, whose films have spanned Israel’s last 40 years.
Chanowitz, known for a raunchy sense of humor, commented, “When I write, it has to make me and my friends laugh.”
On Thursday night, award-winning filmmaker and Sam Spiegel graduate Nadav Lapid will host a master class at the school’s Jerusalem campus.
