Chanukah Film Festival Tops Entertainment Choices

Jewish film fans will have a second chance to see some of the most popular films featured in this year’s Atlanta Jewish Film Festival. Until Dec. 5, Menemsha Films, a leading source for the Jewish film festival circuit, is presenting the selections in its virtual Chanukah Film Festival.

Among the offerings is “Here We Are,” a moving story of a father’s love for his autistic adult son and the difficult choices that confront him as his son matures, which won this year’s AJFF Jury Prize and the audience award for the best feature-length fictional film.

The film won Israel’s top film honor, the Ophir, for best director, as well as walking off with awards for best screenplay, best actor and best supporting actor. (It was also one of the Best Bets selected by Emory’s Matthew Bernstein and myself for this year’s AJFF.)

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The critically acclaimed Israeli film, “Here We Are,” is one of the offerings of this Chanukah Film Festival.

The Chanukah Film Festival is also screening “Kiss Me Kosher,” which was shown on opening night at the AJFF and had its North American premiere here. The romantic comedy also opened the Chattanooga Jewish Film Festival this year and was nominated for the Building Bridges Jury Prize at the AJFF in Atlanta. A co-production by filmmakers in Germany and Israel, the same-sex rom-com brings together two families from very different cultural backgrounds just before the wedding of their daughters.

For younger audiences there’s Johanne Helgeland’s film, “The Crossing,” a Norwegian production that follows a young girl as she bravely traverses the country’s wilderness to save two Jewish children from the Nazis. It won Norway’s award for best children’s film and garnered Helgeland this year’s AJFF Jury Prize for best young filmmaker.

Rounding out the Chanukah Festival offerings are the Italian film, “A Starry Sky Above the Roman Ghetto,” which had its East Coast premiere at the AJFF this year and “Leona,” a Mexican film about a love affair between a Syrian Jewish woman and a non-Jewish man that was chosen for the AJFF Young Professionals Night in 2019. Also being shown is “The Midnight Orchestra,” from Morocco, which I reviewed for the 2016 AJFF.

“The Crossing” is a family-friendly film that won a prize at this year’s AJFF.

There are a total of eight films at the Chanukah Film Festival, one for each night of the holiday. Many of them come with programs that feature the directors, screenwriters and stars of the selected films. Discounted tickets, for as little as $36, give you access to the films for 14 days from the time you first log on. To make such a bargain price possible, Menemsha has partnered with dozens of synagogues and Jewish film festivals around the country to provide discounted tickets. To get the discount, copy this link in your browser: https://www.chaiflicks.com/checkout/ajff-hanukkah-film-festival-2021/purchase.

On Chai Flix, the Menemsha streaming platform, which requires a separate subscription, the company has just premiered “Checkout,” one of the most popular programs ever aired on KAN, the Israeli state-supported broadcasting channel. It’s a comedy series set in a grocery store in a Tel Aviv suburb.

The National Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene, which has been entertaining audiences for 107 years, is back with “ESN,” a virtual celebration of Jewish food through song and cooking demonstrations. It is streaming without charge until Dec. 6. at www.watch.nytf.org. The program stars Frank London and Lorin Sklamberg of the Grammy-award winning group Klezmatics.

For a real taste of the old country, Jewzy.com, another subscription Jewish film site, has several Yiddish film classics from the 1930s — the golden age of the genre. You can find a retelling of the story of Tevya the Milkman that inspired the Broadway hit “Fiddler on the Roof,” and “The Golem,” a classic Jewish tale of the supernatural.

Itzhak Perlman, the famed violinist, is featured in a Chanukah music program from WABE, the NPR Atlanta affiliate.

Atlanta’s WABE, the National Public Radio affiliate, is bringing back Atlanta favorite violinist Itzhak Perlman, with his Chanukah Radio Party. The program airs Dec. 5 at 4 p.m. and features recordings Perlman particularly likes, including songs in Yiddish and Ladino. The story of the Festival of Lights is also retold in Perlman’s own special way.

Free music videos are available on YouTube from the likes of Matisyahu, the Maccabeats, Six13, the Indigo Girls, and Adam Sandler, among others.

Both Spotify and Amazon Music have free Chanukah playlists that provide well over an hour of uninterrupted music to accompany your latke party or dreidel competition.

Amazon Prime Video is broadcasting its Chanukah children’s program, “Special Agent Oso.”

For those looking for Chanukah programming aimed at children during the last days of the holiday, there is an abundance of choices, due in part to the growth of streaming on the internet.

The durable Rugrats Chanukah — from season 4, episode 1 of the series — is available on Amazon Prime Video and Paramount Plus.

Amazon also has “Special Agent Oso” and “The Living Holiday Lights,” parts 1 and 2. Disney Plus has the “The Latke Kerfuffle” and “Nine Lights Tonight” episodes of “Puppy Dog Pals,” and the “Festival of Lights” program from “Elena of Avalor.”