The Jerusalem Film Festival has announced international films that will be shown during the 42nd edition, which runs at the Jerusalem Cinematheque and at Lev Smadar Cinema July 17-26, and there will be many prizewinners and much-anticipated movies from the top film festivals around the world in this year’s lineup.
Tickets to the festival films are now on sale at the festival website at https://jff.org.il/en, which also features the full screening schedule.
Some of the highlights this year will include Dreams, the new film by Michel Franco, starring Jessica Chastain, about a wealthy woman and her romance with a Mexican ballet dancer desperate to immigrate to the US, which screened in the official Competition at the Berlin Film Festival.
The latest film by the Dardenne brothers, The Young Mother’s Home, about five young mothers living in a shelter, won the Best Screenplay Award at Cannes.
The Secret Agent is a new film, directed by Kleber Mendonça Filho, about a Brazilian technology expert who decides to seek a quiet life in his hometown, which doesn’t turn out as he planned. It won the Best Director and Best Actor Awards at Cannes.
Actor Harris Dickinson (Triangle of Sadness, Babygirl) has made his directorial debut with Urchin, about a homeless man in London, which was shown in the Un Certain Regard section at Cannes.
The Things You Kill, a mystery by Iranian-Canadian director Alireza Khatami, won the Best Director Award at Sundance’s international competition.
The new film by Jerusalem Film Festival favorite Sergei Loznitsa, Two Prosecutors, premiered at Cannes and tells the story of an idealistic young prosecutor rooting out corruption in the USSR in 1937. It stars Anatoliy Beliy, a Ukrainian actor who recently moved to Israel and has appeared in several movies and television series here, including Motherland on KAN.
The classics section is the most popular
The classics section is one of the best loved parts of the festival. This year, the classics section will be especially diverse, and will include horror classic The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, which will be screened alongside Chain Reactions, a new documentary by Alexandre O. Philippe about the film’s legacy, featuring Stephen King, Takashi Miike, Patton Oswalt, and Karyn Kusama.
Michelangelo Antonioni’s masterpiece The Passenger, starring Jack Nicholson, will be screened as part of the Jerusalem Cinematheque’s 50th anniversary celebration.
David Perlov’s 1972 film, The Pill, will be shown in a print that has been newly restored by the Israel Film Archive at the Jerusalem Cinematheque.
The Jerusalem Film Festival will also feature a previously announced program of new Israeli films, both in and out of competition.
The festival will open at Jerusalem’s Sultan’s Pool on July 17 with the premiere screening of Sentimental Value, directed by Joachim Trier (The Worst Person in the World), winner of the Grand Prix at the Cannes Film Festival.
Wonder Woman star Gal Gadot and Pulp Fiction producer Lawrence Bender will be present at the opening.
The festival will host a number of competitive sections for international cinema: the International Competition, International Debuts, In the Spirit of Freedom, and the Chantal Akerman Competition, which is named for the late Belgian director.
In addition to the official competitions, international films will also be presented in a variety of other sections, including Masters, Panorama, Gala, and Intersections.
The festival is supported by the Culture and Sport Ministry, the Van Leer Foundation, the Jerusalem Foundation, and the Jerusalem Municipality.