Docaviv, the Tel Aviv International Student Film Festival and TLVFest have all announced their upcoming programs. In addition, Israel’s premier festival, the Jerusalem Film Festival, is also taking place starting on August 24 and will be publicizing the details of its programs in the coming weeks. The Haifa International Film Festival, traditionally held during the Sukkot holiday in autumn, will also be returning in full force.
DOCAVIV, THE Tel Aviv International Documentary Film Festival (https://www.docaviv.co.il/), will take place in person at the Tel Aviv Cinematheque and other venues around the city from July 1-10, and will also offer an online option.
It will feature both Israeli and international competitions for full-length documentaries, as well as for short films, and will feature special events that include master classes with many of the filmmakers.
This year’s opening film will be Queen Shoshana, about the life story of iconic Israeli singer Shoshana Damari, whom the directors call the first Israeli diva, by Kobi Farag and Morris Ben Mayor.
Docaviv will pay tribute to Italian director Gianfranco Rosi, considered one of the world’s leading documentary filmmakers, and will screen a number of his films, among them Fire at Sea, a haunting look at how a tiny Italian island has coped as hundreds of thousands of African migrants land on its shores, which won the Golden Bear at the Berlin International Film Festival.
Julie Goldman, one of the most prolific producers in documentary filmmaking, will attend the festival and give a master class. Several of her films will be shown, including Life, Animated, a look at the life of a young man with autism, and Buck, the life story of “horse whisperer” Buck Brannaman, who overcame years of child abuse to become an expert on horses.
Kurdish director Hogir Hirori will present his latest film, Sabaya, which tells the story of volunteers who rescue Sabaya, Yazidi women and girls abducted by ISIS and held as sex slaves in a camp in Syria. He will give a workshop on filmmaking in war-torn areas.
The Masters section will include City Hall, the latest film by Frederick Wiseman, the director who is one of the most acclaimed practitioners of the cinéma vérité style of documentary filmmaking. City Hall looks at the Boston City Hall and paints a vivid portrait of that city.
The Israeli Competition features an extremely varied slate this year, including Blue Box, a look at the inner workings of the Keren Kayemeth LeIsrael-Jewish National Fund; Dirty Tricks, about cheating accusations in the world of competitive bridge; The Therapy, an exposé about so-called conversion therapy, designed to turn people into heterosexuals; and Viral, a look at seven YouTubers and their work during the pandemic year.
The festival will show a number of films on art and culture, including documentaries about the late comedian John Belushi and on Israeli novelists David Grossman and Amos Oz. Films on music include Tina, a look at the life of Tina Turner, and Under the Volcano, a glimpse into master music producer George Martin’s Caribbean studio.
THE TEL AVIV International Student Film Festival (https://www.taufilmfest.com), which will run from June 20 to 26 this year, was founded in 1986 by film students to highlight student work, and it remains one of Israel’s liveliest festivals.
The festival holds five major competitions: The International Competition, The Israeli Competition, The Short Independent Film Competition, LookOut: The Experimental Film & Video Program and The Digital Media International Exhibition & Competition.
It will take place at the Tel Aviv Cinematheque and other locations in the city.
It will open with the Israeli premiere of Francois Ozon’s Summer of 85, a look at an intense friendship that develops between two teenage boys.
The festival, which features cash prizes for its student winners that are among the highest in the world, collaborated with Samsung this year on a film clip shot entirely on a cellphone.
There will be a number of international guests who will present their films and give master classes, including actress/director Melanie Laurent (Inglourious Bastards), director Claire Denis (Beau Travail, 35 Shots of Rum), cinematographer Frederick Elmes (The Dead Don’t Die), director Bertrand Bonello (Nocturama), director Celine Sciamma (Portrait of a Lady on Fire), Miguel Gomes (Arabian Nights) and Radu Jude, whose latest film, Bad Luck Banging or Loony Porn, just won the Golden Bear at the Berlin International Film Festival.
TLVFest, the LGBT film festival in Tel Aviv (http://tlvfest.com/tlv/he/en/), has announced it will hold a full festival in November, but it is having a mini-festival to celebrate Pride Week, from June 9 to 12.
On opening night this month, TLVFest will show Falling, Viggo Mortensen’s directorial debut, in which he stars as a gay man who brings his homophobic father to live with him, his husband and their daughter.
Also on opening night, Mona Fastvold’s The World to Come will be shown. It stars Katherine Waterston and Vanessa Kirby (The Crown) as two frontier wives in 19th-century America who fall in love.
The program will also include Emma Seligman’s Shiva Baby, the story of a young woman whose complicated relationships are highlighted when she attends a shiva with her parents.