The Soundtrack Tel Aviv Film Festival announces its opening event: the Israeli premiere of the documentary In the Court of the Crimson King: King Crimson at 50, in the presence of director Toby Amies on November 15, 2022. Following the screening, Aviv Geffen will host a Q & A with Amies.*
Amies, who was also the beloved host of MTV Europe’s “Alternative Nation” in the 90s, will also participate in a panel discussion the next day.
King Crimson is like no other band. Robert Fripp is like no other band leader. As the band turns 50, director Toby Amies sets out to create a documentary about the band and ends up exploring questions about ageing, death, time, perfectionism and the true meaning of music. It’s funny and moving. An instant classic in the world of music documentaries.
The late-night event on opening night will be very special as well: Experimental artist and queen of NY’s No Wave scene Lydia Lunch will be a special guest. She will give a spoken word performance as well as a Q&A after the Israeli premiere of Beth B’s documentary Lydia Lunch: The War Is Never Over.
The Soundtrack Tel Aviv Film Festival will take place from November 15 – 19, 2022. The full program and ticket information may be found on the festival website.
Soundtrack Festival Information:
The first ever edition of the Soundtrack Tel Aviv Film Festival, which is dedicated to music in film and TV, will screen more than 40 films – Israeli and international. And the 5 days of the festival will be full of documentaries to musicals, from films with spectacular and ground-breaking soundtracks and scores to cult music films, from premieres to classics and retrospectives, from pop, rock, alternative and punk, to electronic music, jazz, and world music.
In addition to screenings of films from Israel and around the world, the festival will also include live music, workshops, Q&As, talks and lectures, and many curated special events.
Among this year’s highlights:
The festival will award a lifetime achievement award to veteran film composer and conductor Dov Seltzer. Seltzer composed the scores of endless hits of the Israeli screen. He has worked with the most revered directors and helped create some of the most compelling combinations of sight and sound in the history of Israeli cinema. In 1974 the title song of the musical Kazablan (film version) was nominated for a Golden Globe Award, and Seltzer also scored the music for I Love You Rosa – a Moshé Mizrahi film nominated for an Oscar in the category of the best foreign film. Along with the lifetime achievement award, we will hold a special screening of Ervinka, with Seltzer’s famous score performed live on stage by an 8-piece orchestra and singer Uri Brauner Kinrot. Yaron Bahar will conduct and supervise the synchronization of the orchestra’s performance with the film.
In memory of singer Julee Cruise, who passed away this year, the festival will screen Industrial Symphony No. 1: The Dream of the Broken Hearted – a 1990 avant-garde concert performance directed by David Lynch, with music by Angelo Badalamenti and Julee Cruise. In addition, Israeli indie artist Hila Ruach will hold a special tribute performance.
Chalery Baghdad – Eyal Halfon’s documentary about the members of Israel’s Arabic Orchestra – is turning 20 and the festival is celebrating with a special screening, which will be followed by a live performance of music and songs from the Middle East by Yair Dalal, Haim Ankri and Avi Agababa.
The festival will celebrate the 50th birthday of both Jamaica’s first feature film, The Harder they Come (including a video Q&A with Justine Henzell, the daughter of THTC’s director, Perry Henzell) and of Bob Fosse‘s evergreen musical Cabaret, starring Liza Minnelli, including live Drag acts on stage.
Heavy metal music and politics will come together in the Israeli premiere of 2021 documentary Truth to Power, following The Grammy-winning lead singer of System of a Down, Serj Tankian, as he helps to awaken a political revolution in Armenia. The screening will be followed by a Q&A with Kobi Farhi, lead singer of Israel’s biggest metal band, Orphaned Land, who have a huge following in the Arab world.
Live on stage: Israeli musicians will give new sounds to classic silent films, such as Buster Keaton’s shorts and Carl Theodor Dreyer’s The Passion of Joan of Arc.
The festival will hold a video Q&A with director Slava Tsukerman to celebrate the 40th anniversary of cult sci-fi film Liquid Sky, known for its super-influential aesthetics and ground-breaking synthesizer music.
The festival will screen Israeli premieres of music docs such as In the Court of the Crimson King: King Crimson at 50, Don’t Go Gentle: A Film About Idles, Freakscene: The Story of Dinosaur Jr., I Get Knocked Down (the Chumbawamba doc), The Rumba Kings about Congolese Rumba, Mr. Soul! (America’s first black “Tonight Show”), and more.
*Information and texts were provided by the Soundtrack Tel Aviv Film Festival press release and lightly edited.
