The Haifa International Film Festival will take place from October 15 – 26, 2024. Now in its 40th edition, the festival returns after a painfully difficult and challenging year for the entire country, ever since the war broke out on October 7th, the last day of the 2023 festival. We all hope for the return of the hostages, wish full recovery to those wounded and share in the sorrow of those who have lost loved ones.
There is an exciting lineup of Israeli films to be shown at the festival reflecting people’s lives, loves, dreams, sorrows, resilience, and creativity. This year, for the first time, the Israeli Film Competition will include both fiction and documentary films, 13 in all – 7 fiction and 6 documentaries. Festival Artistic Director Yaron Shamir stated: “As it is our understanding – as has been established in the most important festivals in the world (Cannes, Venice, Berlin, Locarno, Karlovy Vary, and others), that neither genre is more important or more creative than the other, we decided to hold one, high quality, competition, that will showcase the best of Israeli cinema, both fiction and documentary.”
New this year is a platform for Israeli premieres: First Exposure – New Israeli Cinema, presenting the diversity and quality of Israeli filmmaking.
Israeli Film Competition
Outsider. Freud
Israel/Austria/Germany/2024/66 min/Hebrew, English, French, German/English and Hebrew subtitles
Director: Yair Qedar; Production: Yair Qedar; Screenplay: Yair Qedar; Camera: Uri Akerman; Editing: Noit Geva, Tommy Shles Shafrir; Sound: Grand Post Studios, Vienna; Music: Max Lieblif
The life and work of Sigmund Freud, as told in four scenes from his life. Through Freud’s personal letters, animation, recreation of his study, rare archival material of home movies never before revealed, and interviews with leading psychoanalysts, the film takes us on an intimate and thought provoking journey of the dreams, Judaism, sexuality, anxieties and regrets of the Viennese psychoanalyst.
Girls Like Us
Israel/2023/87 min/Hebrew/English and Hebrew subtitles
Director: Lee Gilat; Production: Aviv Ben Shlush, Roei Zioni, Ori Burg; Screenplay: Batel Moseri; Camera: Amit Yasur; Editing: Einat Glaser-Zarhin; Soundtrack: Ami Arad, Ran Zruya; Cast: Hili Yosef-Zada, Hadar Dror, Batel Moseri
Shahar, a pretty and clever girl, full of light and charisma, lives in one of the toughest neighborhoods in Bat Yam, with her dysfunctional family. Her parents are divorced, her father is in a mental institution, and her mother, who dreams of getting married, has problems with alcohol and men. Shahar is the one who takes care of her little sister Moran. Shahar, who left regular public school, studies at Beit Gila, an alternative framework for girls at risk. Perry, a new soldier-teacher arrives to counsel there. She is an unconventional counselor, charismatic and enigmatic. A relationship of attraction and repulsion develops between the two, and power plays, that begin in the friction between a counselor and a teenager, turn into a close friendship and a love that takes them to the edge.
My Missing Screw
Israel/US/2024/94 min/English, Hebrew/English and Hebrew subtitles
Director: Nitsan Tal; Production: Nitsan Tal; Screenplay: Nitsan Tal; Camera: Nitsan Tal; Editing: Liki Tapuach; Soundtrack: Michael Emet; Music: Joel Kipnis, Zed Kelly
Following a suicide attempt and lengthy stay at a psychiatric hospital, Raffael decides to sculpt his “missing screw” and take it on a journey around the world. He leaves his family and travels with the screw to Dachau, Van Gogh’s grave, the Guggenheim Museum in New York, and the Ganges River in India. Along the way he makes friends, and is enthusiastically accepted by artists and collectors, but his young son, who remained in Israel, feels abandoned. Will Raffael need to choose between life as an artist and his role as a father?
Kafka’s Last Trial
Israel/2024/84 min/Hebrew, German, English/English and Hebrew subtitles
Director: Eliran Peled; Production: Eliran Peled, Talia Harris; Screenplay: Talia Harris, Eliran Peled, Yotam Knispel; Camera: Ben Levy, Ofek Hasid; Editing: Daniel Shuali; Soundtrack: Nin Hazan; Music: Daniel Markovich; Cast: Eli Gorenstein
At his death, Franz Kafka left behind a rich collection of unpublished manuscripts with instructions to his friend Max Brod to burn them all. Brod did not fulfill Kafka’s wishes, and the world came to know one of the great writers of the 20th century. This altruistic betrayal led to a multi-generational curse that is followed throughout this 100-year story that goes from the twisty streets of Prague to Spinoza Street in Tel Aviv, where Brod’s legendary secretary died at the age of 102, with manuscripts remaining in her home that will lead to a trial that could have been written by Kafka himself.
The Property
Israel/Poland/2024/110 min/Hebrew, English, Polish/English and Hebrew subtitles
Director: Dana Modan; Production: Yochanan Kredo; Screenplay: Dana Modan, Rutu Modan; Camera: Yaron Sharf; Editing: Ido Mochrik; Sound: Itzik Cohen; Music: Shuzin; Cast: Rivka Michaeli, Sharon Strimban, Pyotr Pachek, Andeja Savarin
A romantic, comic drama. Regina and her granddaughter Mica travel to Warsaw to reclaim their family property that was taken in World War II. But their mission soon becomes complicated – Regina announces that she is giving up and wants to return to Israel, Mica does not know where to begin, and an annoying distant relative keeps popping up around every corner. When Mica meets a handsome, charming, tour guide and begins to fall in love, Regina finds the path to her real reason for coming to Poland: to find the lost love of her youth, from whom she was parted 70 years ago.
Abortion in the Holy Land
Israel/2024/70 min/Hebrew/English and Hebrew subtitles
Director: Efrat Shalom Danon; Production: Osnat Trabelsi; Screenplay: Efrat Shalom Danon; Camera: Tania Iskovitz; Editing: Miri Laufer; Music: Shuzin
In Israel of 2024 women still do not have the rights to their own bodies. Women made the decision to terminate their pregnancy break the conspiracy of silence and talk about the wound, trauma, shame, and pain that make up the difficult emotional process that accompanies the decision to abort.
The Jewish womb in Israel has a role. A national-demographic role assigned to it by the patriarchy. From medical institutions to the government and its different branches, men decided and imposed on women their rule of their wombs. Through personal stories and rare archival material the a complex, strict, unyielding, discriminatory system is revealed, that rules the lives and futures of many women in Israel.
Life Without Cover
Israel/2024/102 min/Hebrew/English and Hebrew subtitles
Director: Tom Shoval; Production: Itay Akirav; Screenplay: Tom Shoval; Camera: Meidan Arama; Editing: Joelle Alexis; Sound: Itzik Cohen; Music: Ben Frost; Cast: Dana Ivgy, Menashe Noy, Fira Kantor, Alica Zannou
Libby, a wild, ageless, mysterious, woman, with no footprint or history, takes us on an unexpected journey. She is desperately looking for Ezra, her legal guardian, who disappeared. With only a few clues about where he might be, Libby begins an intense and surprising odyssey that reveals her unique consciousness.
Halisa
Israel/2024/102 min/Hebrew/English and Hebrew subtitle s
Director: Sophie Artus; Production: Yochanan Kredo; Screenplay: Sophie Artus; Camera: May Abadi-Grebler; Editing: Boaz Leon; Sound: Yuval Bar-On; Music: Ran Bagno; Cast: Noa Koler, Dana Berkovich, Anatoly Bellyy
Sarah is a nurse at the Tipat Halav (Infants Health Center) in the Halisa neighborhood in Haifa. She cares for babies every day but has no children of her own. Sarah has been trying to get pregnant for years, undergoing fertility treatments. When Anya, a young mother in dire circumstances, arrives at the clinic with her baby, Sarah does everything she can to help her. The connection with Anya and Eden, her baby, relieves the deep lack that Sarah feels. Perhaps each can give the other what she needs: a home on one hand and a child on the other.
Day Trippers
Israel/Holland/2024/95 min/Hebrew, English/English and Hebrew subtitles
Director: Veronica Kedar; Production: Veronica Kedar, Tamar Lieberson; Screenplay: Veronica Kedar; Camera: Ido Soskolne; Editing: Veronica Kedar; Sound: Neil Gibbs; Music: Aryeh Hasfari, Avshalom Hasfari; Cast: Naama Amit, Nell Barlow, Joe Sinduhije, Yotam Ishay, Nitai Gvirtz
Zoe is a British teenager who ran away from her mother’s funeral. Ruth is an Israeli who ran away from her wedding. These two lost souls meet in Amsterdam ad go on an emotional and psychedelic journey to regain their trust in the world.
Better Days
Israel/2024/80 min/Hebrew/English and Hebrew subtitles
Director: Alon Gur Arye; Production: Ofer Naim; Screenplay: Alon Gur Arye, Ofer Naim; Camera: Ido Berlad; Editing: Reuven Brodsky; Music: Ben Chopin
The name Ze’ev Revach is associated with an image of a popular and ludicrous comic. His path from Hamlet at the Cameri Theatre, to Elimelch Zurkin, and from there to Mr. Leon is one of the most fascinating plots in Israeli commercial film. The film reveals a man who never found his place or peace of mind. In his home he was not considered religious enough, and in the film world he was not considered enough of a connoisseur. He managed to produce a film every year on a minimal budget. Rare materials, such as an argument with Efraim Kishon over the direction of Sallah Shabati, or reports of controversial directing methods, reveal the fuel for his work: a passion for cinema and the ambition to succeed at film festivals. The tragedy is that he became trapped in the typecast that he created for himself.
A Letter Without an Address
Israel/2024/80 min/Hebrew/English and Hebrew subtitles
Directors: Yael Shachar and Sharon Yaish; Production: Hagi Arad, Aharon Peer, Elad Peleg; Screenplay: Yael Shachar and Sharon Yaish; Camera: Yael Shachar and Avner Shahaf; Editing: Roni Klimovsky, Sharon Yaish; Sound: Aviv Aldema; Music: Ran Bagno
Five letters, sent anonymously, reveal a painful case of emotional and sexual abuse by a psychologist who abused his patients for years. The letters, which were never answered, are revealed, and let the victims make their voices heard for the first time.
Real Estate
Israel/2023/95 min/Hebrew, Arabic, Russian/English and Hebrew subtitles
Director: Anat Maltz; Production: Itai Tamir, Ami Livne, Fred Bellaniche, Aexis Dantec; Screenplay: Anat Maltz; Camera: Omri Aloni; Editing: Anat Maltz; Sound: Michael Gurevitz; Music: Shuzin; Cast: Victoria Rosovsky, Leib Lev Levin
A love story. Tamara and Adam, a young, wild, couple, are about to become parents and their lives are a mess. Just as they are about to be evicted from their apartment in Tel Aviv, Tamara decides to look for their new home in the city of Adam’s birth – Haifa. Over the course of an unforgettable day of apartment hunting they get a brief, yet intimate, glimpse into the lives of others, and the search for a home becomes a journey into the depths of their love.
Of Dogs and Men
Israel/Italy/2024/82 min/Hebrew, Arabic, Russian/English and Hebrew subtitles
Director: Dani Rosenberg; Production: Itai Tamir; Screenplay: Dani Rosenberg, Ori Avinoam, Itai Tamir; Camera: Ziv Berkovich; Editing: Nili Feller; Sound: Itzik Cohen, Neil Gibbs, Oz Sherman; Music: Yuval Semo; Cast: Ori Avinoam, Natan Bahat, Nora Lifshitz, Yamit Avital
Early in the morning, on October 18th, 16-year-old Dar travels back to her home in Kibbutz Nir Oz to look for her dog, who was lost on that black Saturday. There is no sign of the dog on the abandoned Kibbutz and only the memory of Dar’s mother, who was kidnapped from their home, floats in the air.
Israeli Short Film Competition
26 short films, of which 16 are student films, will participate in this year’s short film competitions: the Student Short Film Competition; the Independent Short Film Competition; the Animated Short Film Competition. The winner of the Independent Short Film Competition will be screened for the members of the American Academy and will compete for a place on the list of nominees for an Oscar in the short film category.
Special Screenings
Nina, directed by Ravit Markus, follows wheelchair badminton champion Nina, as she aspires to qualify for what may be her last chance at the Olympics. However, at almost 40, she would also like to have a second child and feels the pressure of her biological clock. A festive premiere in collaboration with the Israel Paralympic Committee.
The Syrian Bride – a festive screening of a restored version, celebrating the film’s 20th anniversary. Directed by Eran Riklis, the film features an outstanding cast including Hiam Abbas, Makram Khoury and Clara Khoury. Mona’s wedding day is the saddest day of her life, for she knows that once she crosses the border between Israel and Syria to marry Talal, she will never be able to return to visit her family in the Druze village of Majdal Shams in the Golan Heights.
Vulcan Junction – a festive screening of a restored version, celebrating the 25th anniversary of the film’s premiere at the Haifa International Film Festival. Directed by Eran Riklis, the film follows a group of friends who hang out at the Haifa bar Vulcan Junction. 10 days of hopes, expectations, dilemmas, loves, disappointments and rock ‘n roll, as the Yom Kippur War looms in their future.
First Exposure – New Israeli Film
3 full-length films will be shown: No Child Spared directed by Meni Philip; All of Us: Hertzel directed by Gad Aisen, and A Place of Her Own directed by Adi Toledano and Dana Pnei-Gil. A selection of Israeli short films will be screened, four independent films, and one student film.
The Haifa International Film Festival takes place with the support of the Ministry of Culture and Sports – Israeli Film Council, the Ministry of Tourism, the Ministry of Regional Cooperation, and the Haifa Municipality. The festival’s Artistic Director is Yaron Shamir, and it is produced by Ethos – The Haifa Municipality Art, Culture and Sports Association Company. The full program and ticket information will be available on the Haifa Film Festival website: https://www.haifaff.co.il/eng.
