News
November 2, 2016“The Last Mentsch” to be Featured at Schenectady JCC’s Jewish Film Festival November 5
On Saturday, November 5 at 7:00 PM, Schenectady JCC and co-sponsor Hadassah Capital District will show the third film of 2016-2017 Jewish Film Festival series, The Last Mentsch, at the Robert and Dorothy Ludwig Schenectady JCC on the Golub Family Campus at 2565 Balltown Road, Niskayuna.
The Last Mentsch (Der letzte Mentsch, 2014, 93 minutes, English, German, Hebrew, Hungarian and Yiddish with subtitles), tells the story of one man, who when faced with his mortality, goes on a quest to reclaim his lost Jewish identity. Director Pierre-Henry Salfati’s tale of friendship and healing explores the cost of forgetting the past and the power of remembering it.
“This film is a beautiful story of the importance of identity and the influences, good and bad that make us who we are,” said Judy Ben-Ami, Schenectady JCC Director of Jewish Cultural & Adult Programming. “When Marcus and Gül start their trip to the heart of old Jewish Europe, neither realizes how their worlds will come together to form an unexpected bond.”
Menachem Teitelbaum (Mario Adorf) escaped Auschwitz with his life and left his Jewishness behind. With a new persona, Marcus Schwartz moves to Cologne where he lives as a “normal” German. With no Jewish friends, no family, no wife, no synagogue, he lives his life pretending that Auschwitz never happened to him.
One day, with more years behind him than ahead of him, a stroll alongside a Jewish cemetery brings his past rushing back. He suddenly has a momentous wish that when he dies, he wants to be buried there. But in order to be interred there, a person has to be Jewish and to his surprise, the rabbis refuse his request. A rabbi points out, “If you say you’re Jewish, you have to prove it!” He shows them his tattoo from Auschwitz, but this is not enough.
The only solution is for Marcus is to go back to his hometown in Hungary to find evidence of his Jewish birth and reclaim his true identity.
Determined to establish his ancestry, Marcus enlists the help of Gül (Katharina Derr), a brash, chain-smoking Turkish woman with a troubled history of her own. The unlikely duo sets out on a road trip to a small village on the Hungarian-Romanian border, a journey that will irrevocably change them both.
Following the film, there will be a discussion led by Rabbi Theodore Lichtenfeld and Rabbi Avraham Kelman.
Rabbi Lichtenfeld, of Congregation Agudat Achim, was a Crown Fellow at the Rabbinical School of the Jewish Theological Seminary, from which he was ordained in 2001. He also holds ordination from the Academy for Jewish Religion. He was a fellow at the Conservative Yeshiva in Jerusalem in 2002. Rabbi Lichtenfeld has served as spiritual leader at Congregation Beth Shalom in Pompton Lakes, NJ, and at Congregation Shir Chadash in Metairie, LA, where he helped the congregation through Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath.
Rabbi Kelman of Congregation Beth Israel received his Semicha from Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary in 1983. For sixteen years, he served as Rabbi to Congregation Ahabat Sholom in Lynn, MA, and as a Dayan (Rabbinical Judge) on the Rabbinical Court of Justice in Boston, MA. Rabbi Kelman previously served as Chief Rabbi of the city of Trieste, Italy and was Rabbi of the Bucharian Congregation of Kew Gardens Hills, NY. Rabbi Kelman is a member of the Rabbinical Council of America and is also a Shochet, a Mohel, and Sofer.
Individual films are $5 per person for Schenectady JCC members and $10 per person for community members. Admission is free for students with school ID. Festival passes are $35 for Schenectady JCC members and $70 for community members. Admission includes film, discussion, and light refreshments.
The Schenectady JCC’s 2016-2017 Jewish Film Festival is sponsored by the Jewish Federation of Northeastern NY. This program is made possible through the generous support of the Epstein Jewish Cultural Fund, Meyer & Mary Kurland/Gebell Fund, Jonas and Edith Flemiberg Jewish Cultural Fund, Schenectady JCC Friends of the Arts, and in part by a grant from the Schenectady County Legislature through its County Initiative Program.
For more information and to register, call Judy Ben-Ami at 518-377-8803.
