Gold for Fools

An immigrant worker at a pickle factory is accidentally preserved for 100 years and wakes up in modern day Brooklyn. He learns his only surviving relative is his great grandson, a computer coder who he can’t connect with.

Based her grandfather’s boyhood in St. Louis, Yasmin Gorenberg tells a story of the pain passed from refugee parents to their children and the hope that can overcome it. “40 Nickels” captures the image of a generation of immigrants to the United States in the 1920’s and 1930’s and through that spotlights the effects of the 1919 pogroms in Eastern Europe. This is a film about parents and children: how trauma never leaves a family, and how hope and resilience is also passed down. It asks the question: Can a new generation look at the world with wonder rather than fear?

Set in Berlin and New York's Lower East Side, The Great Yiddish Love stars the self-exiled Marlene Dietrich and her Nazi-endorsed replacement, Zarah Leander. It is a melodrama of love, emigration, and betrayal reassembled from Hollywood, German Ufa and Yiddish films from the 1930s and 40s.

The Man Without a World is credited to the legendary (and imaginary) 1920s Soviet director, Yevgeny Antinov. But the film is anything but old. In fact, Antinov himself is the creation of contemporary filmmaker Eleanor Antin. Her film is a moving, comic melodrama set in a typical shtetl (village) in Poland. The Jews’ struggle against poverty and racial hatred is complicated by their own division into hostile political factions of the religious orthodoxy, assimilationists, socialists, Zionists, anarchists and survivors. While the Jews of the shtetl pursue their loves, politics, religion, business and dreams for the future, the Angel of Death is ever near...

Motel, a poor laborer, loving husband and new father, leads cloakmakers in a strike for better working conditions. When he is severely injured by strikebreakers, his wife, Esther, and infant son are left destitute. Desperate to save her starving child, Esther gives him up for adoption to a wealthy couple, and then commits suicide. The richly-rendered beautiful Yiddish songs by Sholem Secunda featuring Cantor Leibele Waldman and Joel Feig's famous choir are a good example of the bittersweet melodrama in the finest tradition of the Yiddish theater.

Lithuania, 1941, during World War II. Hundreds of thousands of texts on Jewish culture, stolen by the Germans, are gathered in Vilnius to be classified, either to be stored or to be destroyed. A group of Jewish scholars and writers, commissioned by the invaders to carry out the sorting operations, but reluctant to collaborate and determined to save their legacy, hide many books in the ghetto where they are confined. This is the epic story of the Paper Brigade.

Elliott Gould narrates this affectionate look at life in the shtetls of Eastern Europe in the 19th and early 20th centuries. "It's unreal that all this could have just disappeared," says Polish native Mariem Adler Stok, one of the seniors whose memories of this "Yiddish world" give this documentary its life. The hour traces Jewish history in Europe and explores Jews' focus on education, their religious customs, clothing, food, music and theater.

A bissele Glik

The questioning of Jewish heritage and identity via the portrait of a diversed family, across Belgium and the United States.

An upbeat, witty, and timely exploration of a global community of artists creating innovative work in their quest to rediscover and revitalise the endangered Yiddish language. From behind-the-scenes with an acclaimed Yiddish-language version of Yentl in Melbourne, to enjoyably transgressive punk-Klezmer musicians, and Barrie Kosky’s latest trailblazing production in Berlin – the endangered Yiddish language is alive and well in this rousing documentary. The language originated amongst the Jewish community in Eastern Europe, but almost disappeared when more than half of the world’s Yiddish speakers were murdered during the Holocaust. Most of the artists and performers (aka Yiddishists) in the film didn’t grow up speaking Yiddish, but all have found solace, identity, and inspiration in its rich traditions and culture. Ros Horin has mapped a fascinating cultural history.

One livid dawn, a cold and damp wind blows as a man walks alone through the darkness. Deputy Police Superintendent Francesco Prencipe is on his way to meet his best friend, Judge Giovanni Mastropaolo whom he hasn't seen for almost two years. The men drive for two hours and exchange but a few words. Later that morning, the Judge is found dead, a single gunshot wound to his head. Francesco is the last person who saw him and his fingerprints are the only ones found in the house. But is he the murderer?

After his career fails to take off, a gifted cricketer in his mid-thirties decides that he’s not ready to give up quite yet.

After an incident in a bar, Laurentiu dies due to a serious head injury. The film accompanies him through his last living day and offers a glimpse into his last moments. Based on a real life story.

Siege of Leningrad, 1942. Despaired Nina Voronova evacuates from the city, leaving her little son along in a deadly cold apartment. He is found by Katya, a teenage girl from next door. She claims he’s her brother, and manages to get extra food provision from the district administration. When Alexey Voronov arrives to the city, he realises this little boy is his son.

Peter is approaching 30 and still trying to navigate modern online dating culture. After a whimsical, romantic evening with a mysterious young woman ends with him waking up alone, Peter tries to put the night behind him by turning to a mythically effective dating site guaranteed to find his perfect match. But with each date from the site, Peter notices strange similarities between each woman and that first amazing date. As he learns the truth about their connection, he'll discover a whole new world of people and experiences that will make him question the nature of identity, attraction, and love.

This is a story about three friends who decided to ride a surf in Mexico. Everything is as it should be: the ocean, girls and golden sand. History does not portend surprises. But not for our heroes, who first of all properly celebrated their arrival. Having hardly woken up in the morning, the guys find themselves in the middle of the beach, they are confused - they do not remember what happened the day before. But soon there are people who refresh their memory: it turns out that last night the guys terribly hurt the international crime boss Juan, who for some reason wants to kill them. Hiding from the persecution, without money and documents, they find salvation - dress up as girls and participate in the women's surfing tournament. Victory will help you win one hundred thousand dollars and get out of the country. But they still don’t know that their imperfect plan will be hindered by love, secret secret services, the mafia and even fighting roosters.

After connecting on an online dating site a young man and woman spend an evening together and connect ways they never imagined.