April 30th: “Three Days in April” Nesselbuhl, Germany, April 1945. A small Swabian village, shortly before the end of the war. The roaring guns of the approaching American troops can be heard in the distance. Only Anna, daughter of the innkeeper and lead of the German Girls Society (BDM), still believes in trusting the Fuhrer. But then, overnight, a train arrives at the village station bringing a horror nobody is prepared for: three cattle
cars of prisoners- Jews – being moved to a concentration camp farther from the Allied Forces. The prisoners remain on the tracks for three days, strangers, for whom no one wants to be responsible. Life goes on as usual in Nesselbuhl. Only for young Anna, nothing will ever be the same. German with English subtitles. 105 minutes.

May 7th: “Four Friends” Four Women, Jews and Palestinians, who were roommates at an Anglican boarding school in Jerusalem in 1939, meet 50 years later for a reunion. For Olga and Sharon, the Israelis, the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948 was the fulfillment of a dream, but for Selma and Wadad, the Palestinians, it spelled the beginning of a lifelong tragedy. Their emotional reunion encapsulates the drama and pain rocking the region. Hebrew with English subtitles. 60 minutes.

May 14th: “Closed Country” – Many years after World War II, evidence showing a connection between Swiss policy and the deportation and murder of Charles and Sabine Sonabend’s parents at Auschwitz fall into Charles’ hands. This startling film documents the journey of the brother and sister back to Switzerland, where they confront people from their past, including a former government border official and a nun from a monastery where the children briefly were hidden. The insensitive and intolerant attitude of these Swiss people is shocking. French and German with English Subtitles. 86
minutes.

May 21st: “East and West” with Molly Picon - This delightful comedy opens as Morris Brown, a New Yorker better acquainted with his checkbook than his prayer book, returns to Galicia with his very American daughter, Mollie (Molly Picon) for a family wedding. The bride, daughter of his traditionally observant brother, and Mollie, whose exuberant antics fill the film, could not be more different. But Mollie unexpectedly meets her match, an engaging young yeshiva scholar who forsakes tradition and joins the secular world to win her heart. East and West features classic scenes of Molly Picon lifting weights and boxing, teaching young villagers to shimmy and stealing away from services to gorge herself before sundown on Yom Kippur. Underlying these hijinks is veteran
filmmaker Goldin's affectionate appreciation of differences, for good-natured comedy shapes his portrayal of worldly Jews encountering traditional shtetl life. Yiddish with English Intertitles, 95 minutes.

May 28th: “Rosensweig’s Freedom” A man fighting for justice is faced with a brick wall of prejudice in this political drama from Germany. Michael Rosenzweig (Christoph Gareissen) is a working-class German Jew married to a woman originally from Vietnam (Uyen Van Thi Dao). One day, Michael and his family are attacked by a gang of racist skinheads; Michael flees in the melee that follows, and the gang's leader later turns up dead. Michael is charged with murder in the skinhead's death, and even though he isn't guilty of the crime, Michael's attorney brother (Benjamin Sadler) finds he has his work
cut out for him in dealing with the German legal system, dominated by people who traditionally have little sympathy for Jews or Asians. Originally produced for German television, Rosenzweig's Freiheit was a prize-winning entry at the 1999 Hollywood Film Festival. German with English Subtitles. 89 minutes.