Teaching Through Films

Session Submission Type: Meeting

Abstract

The AJS film committee is excited to provide an opportunity to explore teaching through films with two award-winning directors. As part of our 2024 Jewish Film series, we will explore the potential of Jewish films in the classroom. The films in our series intersect with memory, personal and collective, Jewish identity, and Jewish survival. Dr. Rachel Schaff and Dr. Daniela Goldfine will moderate the panel. The directors, Adam Golfer and Gabriel Lichtmann, will explain the significance of their films A Matter of Opinion and The Red Star (see the film series full abstract) for exploring Jewish memory and identity in the classroom. A Matter of Opinion is Golfer's reimagining of a 1995 interview his Jewish grandfather and wife did with their Ghanaian-American neighbor, prompted by her high school assignment to interview someone who was alive during the Second World War. The Red Star is a captivating film about Laila Salama, a mystery. Daughter of an M16 spy, a Miss Teen Beauty, Rommel’s lover, and Wiesenthal’s informant, she took part in the operation to capture Adolf Eichmann in Argentina. The film backdrop of Purim centers the theme on Jewish survival and the creativity that made it possible (Grisar). Please watch the films in preparation for the discussion; an opportunity will be provided for questions from the audience.

Moderators:
Dr. Rachel Schaff is Assistant Professor of Media Studies at Mercer University in Macon, GA. She has published in Afterimage, Cinema et Cie, Nineteenth Century Theatre and Film, Screen, The Spectator, and Studies in Eastern European Cinema. She researches melodrama and Holocaust memorialization across cinematic forms and national contexts.

Dr. Daniela Goldfine is Assistant Professor of Spanish at the University of Wisconsin-River Falls. She is a member of the Board of Directors of the Latin American Jewish Studies Association (LAJSA) and a member of the AJS Diversity, Equity, and Inclusivity Committee. She is also a member of the 2024 University of Wisconsin System Women’s and Gender Studies Consortium Committee, as well as of the AJS 56th Annual Conference Film Committee. She is co-editor of the Jewish Latin American Women Authors, Filmmakers, and Characters (a forthcoming LAJS special issue). Her research focuses on issues of memory and identity in contemporary Jewish Argentine cultural production.


Panelists:
Adam Golfer is a filmmaker, artist, and cinematographer based in New York. His studio practice combines elements of personal essay films, photography, book making and installation. Golfer’s projects frequently explore the ambiguous boundaries between personal and collective memory. Some of these borders occur as physical divisions in the natural landscape, others are psychological. He holds an MFA from the Interdisciplinary Studio Art program at Hunter College in New York and was part of the 2022-2023 artist cohort of the New Jewish Culture Fellowship. Golfer is a recipient of the Elizabeth Firestone Graham Foundation Grant, a Puffin Foundation Grant, and the Snider Prize in Photography. His films and photography installations have been shown at Underdonk Gallery , Hunter College, Goucher College the Jewish Museum of Maryland, the Museum of Contemporary Photography at Columbia College in Chicago among others. His 2016 photographic monograph, “A House Without a Roof” was shortlisted for the Paris Photo-Aperture First Book Award in 2016-2017. In 2024, he published, “Kaddish,” his second book of images and texts.

Gabriel Lichtmann was born in Buenos Aires in 1974; he graduated as a Film Director from the Universidad del Cine. He has worked in various formats, including short films, documentaries, commercials, music videos, TV shows, and feature films. He has won several national and international awards for his work, including screenplay prizes and film festival honors. His films have been well-received by critics and
audiences, and he has participated in numerous international festivals such as the Berlin Film Festival, Montreal World Film Festival, and BAFICI. Currently, he works on various fiction and documentary projects as a director, screenwriter, and producer.

Works Cited

Grisar, PJ. “In a Delightful New Purm Film, Esther is a Secret Agent in Argentina.” Forward, 15 March 2022, https://forward.com/culture/484006/purim-movie-red-star-esther-haman-argentina-hitler-jcc-manhattan-lichtmann/, Accessed 22 September 2024.

Sub Unit

• AJS

Zoom Host

• Zoom Host 18