5th Moscow Jewish Film Festival


The 5th Moscow Jewish Film Festival is an annual international film festival, which aims to gather in the program features, documentaries, shorts and animated films on the subject of Jewish culture, history and national identity and contemporary problems.
The festival was held in Moscow from 23 to 30 June 2019 at the Jewish Museum and Tolerance Center, Documentary Film Center, cinema GUM, KARO 11 cinema Oktyabr, Moskino Zvezda, Moskino Kosmos, Knizhniki and Moscow Jewish Community Center.

Opening film

The ceremony opened with the concert of the composer Alexei Aigui and Ensemble 4'33'. The welcome speech at the Opening ceremony was held by the President of Jury Timur Weinstein and American director Shawn Snyder presented his film To Dust as the Russian premiere and the opening film of the 5th Moscow Jewish Film Festival.

Jury

Main Competition
Documentary Film Competition Jury
Narrative Short Film Competition Jury
A public council, created in 2017, continued its work and included the following filmmakers and leaders of the Jewish community:

Main Competition

The educational program was organized with the support of the Genesis Philanthropy Group.
Stephen Mao held a discussion about significance of the film Skin in today's political and social environment. The Q&A session following the documentary Jonathan Agassi Saved My Life took place in Documentary Film Center, where Jonathan Agassi’s mother Anna Langer and film director Tomer Haymann talked about a story of love and trust.
Main Competition participants were invited to Moscow to present their films and talk to MJFF audience. Thus, Eliran Malka presented his film The Unorthodox and the star of Red Cow Avigaiil Kovari with Israeli sexologist Katya Katsman held discussion about female friendship, old traditions and modern prohibitions. Seder-Masochism were presented by its director Nina Pailey, who held a Q&A session with film critic Dina Goder. A conversation about love, loss and decomposition followed the screening of To Dust with Shawn Snyder as a guest.
A Q&A “Filming in Ethiopia with an international crew” led by Yotam Ishay — Graduate of the Film and Television department in Tel-Aviv University, following the screening of the feature film Fig Tree took place at the Oktyabr Cinema center.
The Jewish Museum and Tolerance center hosted the screening of Triumph Over Violence and arranged a dispute “Why everyone should watch Triumph Over Violence” with Nikolai Svanidze, Vsevolod Chaplin, Mikhail Gusman, Boruch Gorin, Konstantin Fam, Jacqueline Gmach as special guests.

Events

The 5th Moscow Jewish Film Festival opened with the screening of To Dust, directed by American director Shawn Snyder, who held the welcome speech at the Opening with the President of Jury Timur Weinstein. The closing ceremony of the 5th Moscow Jewish Film Festival was held in the Moskino Kosmos. The jurors presented awards in each of the four competition categories and one special prize.
Moreover, within the festival the Honorable prize for outstanding contribution to the development of Jewish cinema in Russia was presented to Dmitry Astrakhan for his film From Hell to Hell.
This year Yakov Kaller award for the best Russian Jewish film of 2019 was given to Anna's War by Aleksey Fedorchenko. Elena Kaller, Yakov Kaller’s widow, presented the award to producer of the film Artyom Vasilyev.
The inaugural special Organizers' Award was bestowed upon director Nina Paley, the author of the animated feature Seder-Masochism.
Berel Lazar, the Chief Rabbi of Russia, awarded the Special Award of the 5th Moscow Jewish Film Festival for Contribution to Preservation of Sephardic Culture and History to Yigal Dias Benzion, the President of the Jewish Community of Oporto who represented the film “Sefarad”.

Winners