“The Interpreter”
Sunday, September 15, 2019, 4:00PM, Figge Art Museum Auditorium (225 W. 2nd Street, Davenport, IA) – 113 minutes – German, Slovak, Russian with English subtitles – Drama– 2018
80-year-old Ali Ungar comes across a book by a former SS officer describing his wartime activities in Slovakia. He realizes his parents were executed by him. He sets out to take revenge but finds instead his 70-year-old son, Georg, a retired teacher. Georg, who had avoided his father all his life, decides to find out more about him and offers Ali to be his interpreter. The two old men, in everything opposite, embark on a bittersweet journey to meet surviving witnesses of the wartime tragedy. They discover a country eager to forget its past. They realize their memories are fragments mixed with their imagination and interpretation. They connect in silence and manage to discover their own identity.
“Itzhak”
Sunday, September 22, 2019, 4:00PM, Figge Art Museum Auditorium (225 W. 2nd Street, Davenport, IA ) – 82 minutes – English and Hebrew with English Subtitles – Documentary – 2018
From Schubert to Strauss, Bach to Brahms, Mozart to…Billy Joel, Itzhak Perlman’s violin playing transcends mere performance to evoke the celebrations and struggles of real life; “praying with the violin,” says renowned Tel Aviv violinmaker Amnon Weinstein. Alison Chernick’s enchanting documentary looks beyond the sublime musician to see the polio survivor whose parents emigrated from Poland to Israel, and the young man who struggled to be taken seriously as a music student when schools saw only his disability. Itzhak himself is funny, irreverent and self-deprecating, and here his life story unspools in conversations with masterful musicians, family and friends, and most endearingly his devoted wife of 50 years, Toby. Itzhak and Toby’s lives are dedicated to their large, loving, Jewish family in NYC and their continual support of young musicians.
“Fig Tree”
Sunday, October 6, 2019, 4:00 PM, Figge Art Museum Auditorium (225 W. 2nd Street, Davenport, IA) – 93 minutes – Amharic and Hebrew with English Subtitles- Drama – 2018
Mina is 16 years old. The Ethiopian Civil War has been underway her entire life. She lives with her brother and grandmother in a humble house with newsprint for wallpaper. The family is Jewish and is planning to flee Ethiopia for Israel, where Mina’s mother awaits their reunion. But this plan leaves out the person Mina loves most: Eli, her Christian boyfriend, who lives in the woods so as to evade being drafted into Mengistu Haile Mariam’s army. Mina hatches a scheme to save Eli, but everyone and everything seems set against her.
“Leona“
Sunday, October 20,2019, 4:00 PM, Figge Art Museum Auditorium (225 W. 2nd Street, Davenport, IA) – 95 minutes -Spanish with English Subtitles – Drama- 2019
“Leona” is an intimate, insightful, and moving film that tells the story of a young Jewish woman from Mexico City who finds herself torn between her family and her forbidden love. Ripe with all the drama and interpersonal conflicts of a Jane Austen novel, watching her negotiate the labyrinth of familial pressure, religious precedent, and her own burgeoning sentiment is both painful and beautiful — there are no easy choices to be made and the viewer travels back and forth with her as she struggles with her heart to take the best path.
Tickets available at the door. Adults $7; Seniors (60+) and Military $6; Students Free. For info call (309) 793-1300.
The Gordon Ney Jewish Film Series is part of the Jewish Cultural Series 2018, and is sponsored by: Jewel Oscos, Rauch Family Foundation II, Inc., Wheelan-Pressley Funeral Homes, The Joyce and Tony Singh Family Foundation, Quad City Bank & Trust, Randi and Gary Segal Family, Stanley and Bernice Harris Memorial Endowment Fund, Bernard and Irene Goldstein Memorial Endowment Fund, Louis and Ida Fox Rich Fund, and David and Marlyne Weiner Family.
