{"id":13213,"date":"2017-11-01T12:57:36","date_gmt":"2017-11-01T16:57:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/phpstack-562680-2277615.cloudwaysapps.com\/?p=13213"},"modified":"2017-11-01T14:36:02","modified_gmt":"2017-11-01T18:36:02","slug":"this-director-got-death-threats-her-work-will-open-the-other-israel-film-festival-tomorrow","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/phpstack-562680-2277615.cloudwaysapps.com\/2017\/11\/this-director-got-death-threats-her-work-will-open-the-other-israel-film-festival-tomorrow\/","title":{"rendered":"This Director Got Death Threats. Her Work Will Open the Other Israel Film Festival Tomorrow."},"content":{"rendered":"
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\"inWhat better film to open the New York JCC\u2019s Other Israel Film Festival than \u201cIn Between\u201d \u2013 the first feature by a 35-year-old Palestinian woman, with scenes triggering death threats and a fatwa.\u00a0<\/p>\n

With the slogan \u201cFilm. Change. Action,\u201d the 11th<\/sup>\u00a0Annual OIFF opens at the JCC Manhattan\u00a0tomorrow evening (Nov. 2). Director Maysaloun Hamoud will appear in conversation with other filmmakers after the screening. (\u201cIn Between\u201d has already won numerous international film festival awards and opens commercially in the U.S. in January.)\u00a0<\/p>\n

Two of the film\u2019s \u201cin betweens,\u201d lawyer Laila and DJ Salma are part of the Tel Aviv partying, coke-snorting underground Palestinian club scene. To a hot original soundtrack, the gorgeous, chain-smoking Laila heads out into the night with male friends who call the women sluts. She doesn\u2019t care.<\/p>\n

Into their lives comes the sheltered, hijab-wearing Nour. Somebody\u2019s cousin from the conservative Arab town of\u00a0Umm-al-Fahm,\u00a0she moves into their apartment to study for her university exams. A religious Muslim, engaged to be married, she is clearly in between.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Americans aren\u2019t the only ones unfamiliar with the 20-something hip Palestinian scene. While American movie goers can usually tell a feature from a documentary, the fatwa was issued following what Hamoud describes as officials in\u00a0Umm-al-Fahm\u00a0thinking the scenes of straight and gay sex, drinking, and drugs were a shameful documentation of young Palestinians. (To us hard-to-shock Americans, \u201cIn Between\u201d looks a bit like a made-for-television feature or the launch of a TV series.)<\/p>\n

Part of elusive reality, \u201cM.G. Saad,\u201d credited with the Arab party music, doesn\u2019t exist. Hamoud says the fictitious name protects the artist in a country without diplomatic relations with Israel.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The top Israeli filmmaker Shlomi Elkabetz, who was Hamoud\u2019s film school teacher, became her producer. Most touching, the film is dedicated to Shlomi Elkabetz\u2019s sister, the beloved, dead-too-young star Ronit Elkabetz. Her final film, \u201cGet,\u201d co-produced with her brother, politicized Israelis with its depiction of a woman unable to receive a divorce \u00a0(\u201cget\u201d in Hebrew) from her husband or the religious courts in control of Israeli marriages.<\/p>\n

The Other Israel Film Festival runs\u00a0Nov. 2-9\u00a0under the direction of\u00a0Isaac Zablocki, director of the JCC\u2019s Israel Film Center.\u00a0<\/p>\n

One film I\u2019ll be watching\u00a0Nov. 4, \u201cThe Promised Band,\u201d documents a group of Israeli and Palestinian women with little musical talent forming a rock group as a way to meet, crossing borders at times illegally.<\/p>\n

An award-winning documentary that promised to be tough to watch has been cut from the festival since it\u2019s available online. \u201cDeath in the Terminal\u201d uses security camera footage to sift through the chaos of a mob lynching an Eritrean refugee mistaken for a terrorist at the Be\u2019er Sheva bus terminal.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Not all grim, \u201cHoly Air\u201d closes the festival.\u00a0 It\u2019s the story of an Arab-Christian who starts bottling \u201choly air\u201d for tourists.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The festival includes free screenings of shorts on\u00a0Nov. 4. Expanding Carole Zabar\u2019s commitment to film as a first step for social action,\u00a0Nov. 5 breakout sessions bring together activists following \u201cThe Field,\u201d the New York premiere of one man\u2019s attempt to start a Palestinian Center for Nonviolence.<\/p>\n

A few screenings take place away from the JCC\u2019s Upper West Side mother ship\u2014at\u00a0the JCC Harlem on West 118th<\/sup>\u00a0St. and at the NYU King Juan Carlos Center on Washington Square South.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Program and tickets available online at\u00a0otherisrael.org<\/span><\/a>\u00a0or by phone\u00a0646-505-5708<\/span>.<\/p>\n

Some OIFF films can be seen at\u00a0israelfilmcenterstream.org\/<\/span><\/a>.<\/p>\n

\n

\u00a0FYI from 2016: Carole Zabar\u2014The Woman Behind the Other Israel Film Festival<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\n

The views and opinions expressed in this article are the author\u2019s own and do not necessarily reflect those of Lilith Magazine.<\/em>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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