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Note that not all movies are rated. Some content may inappropriate for children.
All of these titles are in DVD format. They may be checked out from the CBE library. Please be sure to properly check out and return all materials.
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Two Jewish teenagers in 1940s New York meet as playground rivals. After injuring Reuven, Danny calls on him at home to apologize. Their wariness turns to fascination and close friendship as each discovers and admires the other's differences. Reuven is experienced, practical, and worldly-wise; while Danny is brilliant and mystical, incredibly erudite in some matters, but incredibly naive in others. To humble him, his father, an immigrant rabbi, has followed the stern tradition of raising him in silence. He thirsts for the wider knowledge represented by Reuven's environment; while Reuven is enraptured by Danny's close-knit family and synagogue community. But can their friendship survive the sharp differences between Danny's ultra Orthodoxy and Reuven's Modern Orthodox Judaism? Danny's people oppose the State of Israel as fanatically as Reuven and his father are working to create it. The issue threatens to make them enemies once again. |
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In Jerusalem's orthodox neighborhoods, it's Succoth, seven days celebrating life's essentials in a sukkot, a temporary shack of both deprivation and hospitality. A devout couple, Moshe and Mali, married nearly five years and childless, are broke and praying for a miracle. Suddenly, miracles abound: a friend finds Moshe a sukkot he says is abandoned, Moshe is the beneficiary of local charitable fundraising, and two escaped convicts arrive on Moshe and Mali's doorstep in time to be their ushpizin - their guests. The miracles then become trials. Rabbinical advice, absolution, an effort to avoid anger, and a 1000-shekel citron figure in Moshe's dark night of the soul. |
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A Jewish boy separated from his family in the early days of WWII poses as a German orphan and is taken into the heart of the Nazi world as a 'war hero' and eventually becomes a Hitler Youth. Although improbabilities and happenstance are cornerstones of the film, it is based upon a true story. |
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Film version of the stage musical, based on the stories of Sholom Aleichem. Tevye the Milkman is a Jewish peasant in pre-Revolutionary Russia, coping with the day-to-day problems of 'shtetl' life, his Jewish traditions, his family (wife and daughters), and state-sanctioned pogroms. |
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Neil Diamond stars as Yussel in this tale of a young Jewish cantor who strives to make a career in music. Against the wishes of his rigid father and his loving wife, Yussel travels to California to play his music. Swept up by the excitement, he meets a woman who shares his dream. He grows apart from his family, and becomes confused about what he should ultimately do with his life. |
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The theme is the founding of the state of Israel. The action begins on a ship filled with Jewish immigrants bound for Israel who are being off loaded on Cyprus. An Intelligence officer succeeds in getting them back on board their ship only to have the harbor blocked by the British with whom they must negotiate. The second part of the film is about the situation in Israel as independence is declared and most of their neighbors attack them. |
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It has been three years since the most important Nazi leaders had already been tried. This trial is about 4 Judges who used their offices to conduct Nazi sterilization and cleansing policies. Retired American Judge, Judge Dan Haywood has a daunting task ahead of him. The Cold War is heating up and no one wants any more trials as Germany, and allied Governments, want to forget the past. But is that the right thing to do is the question that the tribunal must decide. |
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The world's first ever Jewish Hip-Hop Supergroup struggles to make the video which will save their record deal from falling through in this highly unorthodox, completely un-kosher documentary musical. Starring Dr. Dreck as George Segal (as Dr. Dreck?), Master Tav, the cantorial student turned rapper; MC Meshugenah, the koo-koo Jew; and Jew Da, the Rastafarian Jewish Philosopher. Also featuring cameos by Gary Oldman, Debi Mazar, Def Leppard's Vivian Campbell and Sharon Osbourne. This short film captures Chutzpah's underdog battle to stake their claim to fame as one obstacle after another rises in their path. Will they live up to the potential of their now-legendary demo tapes? Will they overcome internal tensions and maternal issues? Will they find the elusive dancers and venue for the music video their career hinges on? Not without a whole lot of chutzpah, and luckily these Hebrew homies got it. |
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While escaping from Nazis during the WWII, a Jewish man dug suitcases full of things dear to his heart in the ground two. The war deprived him of his family, and afterwards he endlessly turns over the soil of Antwerp to find the suitcases, which makes him look obsessed. He keeps checking old maps and keeps digging, trying to find, in fact, those he lost. His daughter Chaya is a beautiful modern girl looking for a part-time job. She finds a place as a nanny in the strictly observant Chassidic family with many children, although her secular manners clearly fly in the face of many commandments. One of the reasons she is accepted is that mother of the family is absolutely overburdened by the household, so she stays despite the resistance of the father, normally - an indisputable authority in the family. She develops a special bond with the youngest of the boys, four-year old Simcha, so far incapable of speaking. She teaches him while walking in the park, and it seems that during the upcoming Passover Seder, Simcha will be able to chant parts of the Haggadah. The old repulsive superintendent of the building is a constant wet blanket for the entire family and now for Chaya. However, as opposed to the observant Jews, she cannot be a victim and is not going to put up with his anti-Semitic tricks, so she fights him, thus exciting the children's admiration and family head's wrath. Unfortunately, walks with Simcha end in a tragedy: after sneaking to the park, he drowns in the pond, and some Chassids hold Chaya responsible. A beautiful, warm picture filled with compassion and humanism, making understandable even the behavior of the superintendent - a mean pathetic anti-Semite: he is so terribly lonely that has only his dog to talk to. |
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To escape the edict of Egypt's Pharoah, Rameses I, condemning all first-born Hebrew males, the infant Moses is set adrift on the Nile in a reed basket. Saved by the pharaoh's daughter Bithiah, he is adopted by her and brought up in the court of her brother, Pharaoh Seti. Moses gains Seti's favor and the love of the throne princess Nefertiri, as well as the hatred of Seti's son, Rameses. When his Hebrew heritage is revealed, Moses is cast out of Egypt, and makes his way across the desert where he marries, has a son and is commanded by God to return to Egypt to free the Hebrews from slavery. In Egypt Moses's fiercest enemy proves to be not Rameses, but someone near to him who can 'harden his heart'. |
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Three parallel strories of immigrants in Tel Aviv during the Gulf War and about coming together while sealed in a room during the Scud attacks. |
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This was one of the first film's to deal with the affects of Nazi Germany's concentration camps on their survivors. Sol Nazerman, operator of a Pawn Shop, and a concentration camp survivor faces a horrid internal conflict. Being engulfed in a New York Getto Environment, Sol suffers flashbacks. The flashbacks juxtapose concentration camp treatment with Getto neighborhood treatment. Although, the flashbacks suffer several historical inaccuracies, the point is well made. His internal conflicts between submitting to the= same injustices he and his family suffered or resisting the injustice= a peak at the end of the film. |
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Five Jewish Hungarians, now U.S. citizens, tell their stories: before March, 1944, when Nazis began to exterminate Hungarian Jews, months in concentration camps, and visiting childhood homes more than 50 years later. An historian, a Sonderkommando, a doctor who experimented on Auschwitz prisoners, and US soldiers who were part of the liberation in April, 1945, also comment. Most telling are details: Renée packing her bathing suit, Irene swallowing the diamonds her mother gave her to buy bread, Alice's memorial for her sister Klara, Bill escaping police by jumping into a line of Jews going to Buchenwald, and Tom told by a US soldier to have "all the damn bananas and oranges you can eat." |
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Sir Martin Gilbert, author of over sixty books and the host of A&E's JERUSALEM, hosts this gripping account of Israel's difficult first years. Filled with rare footage, photographs, and interviews with participants in the War of Independence, this is the definitive document of one of the turning points in modern history. Extraordinary footage filmed by Bernard Beecham, a British soldier, shows the reality of life in the fledgling nation, when all efforts were devoted toward winning the war. |
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The film takes place in 1973 during the Yom Kippur War in which Egypt and Syria launched attacks in Sinai and the Golan Heights. The story is told from the perspective of Israeli soldiers. We are led by Weinraub and his friend Ruso on a day that begins with quiet city streets, but ends with death, destruction and devastation of both body and mind. Various scenes are awash in the surreal, as Weinraub's head hangs out over a rescue helicopter's open door, watching with tranquil desperation as the earth passes beneath, the overpowering whir of the blades creating a hypnotic state. It is not a traditional blood, guts and glory film. There are no men in battle, only the rescue crew trying to pick up the broken pieces. |
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Oskar Schindler is a vain, glorious and greedy German businessman who becomes unlikely humanitarian amid the barbaric Nazi reign when he feels compelled to turn his factory into a refuge for Jews. Based on the true story of Oskar Schindler who managed to save about 1100 Jews from being gassed at the Auschwitz concentration camp. A testament for the good in all of us. |
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During the 1972 Olympic Games in Munich, eleven Israeli athletes are taken hostage and murdered by a Palestinian terrorist group known as Black September. In retaliation, the Israeli government recruits a group of Mossad agents to track down and execute those responsible for the attack. |
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Is today's fanaticism tomorrow's policy? In a West Bank settlement, Rabbi Meltzer has a grand design: he's building a movement "to pray at the Temple Mount." His yeshiva has scholars, and the settlement is getting its own military company to be commanded by Menachem, a disciple of the rabbi. He also wants his daughter, Michal, to marry Pini, the yeshiva's best scholar. Michal has no interest in Pini, but she is attracted to Menachem. When she rebuffs Pini, he hatches a bold and secret plan. Is jealousy the motivation or something else? Meanwhile, the army and Moussad are closely watching the rabbi's activities and Menachem's military training. Who is trustworthy? |
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Elusive peace follows the fraught history of the Arab-Israeli peace process from 1999-2005. |
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David Green is brought into a prestigious 1950s school to help their football team to beat the school's old rivals. David, however, is from a working class background, so he isn't really "one of them", but he's very successful at making friends. David is a Jew, and has to keep this a secret from his friends for fear of being rejected. |
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Whitwell Middle School in rural Tennessee is the setting for this documentary about an extraordinary experiment in Holocaust education. Struggling to grasp the concept of six-million Holocaust victims, the students decide to collect six-million paper clips to better understand the extent of this crime against humanity. The film details how the students met Holocaust survivors from around the world and how the experience transformed them and their community. |
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The unexpected death of the family patriarch throws every member of the Ullmann clan off course. Widow Dafna takes to bed for three months and when she finally returns to her job at the maternity hospital, she has little time for her children. Eldest son, Yair drops out of school and adopts a fatalist attitude, shutting out his siblings and girlfriend. His twin sister Maya, a talented musician, feels the most guilt and is forced to act as a family caregiver at the expense of career opportunities. Bullied at school, younger son Ido responds by obsessively filming himself with a video camera and attempting dangerous feats. The baby sister, Bar, is woefully neglected. Preoccupied with their own misery, the family is barely a family anymore. When another tragedy strikes, will they be able to support one another? |
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Epic, episodic, tale of the lives of a small group of New York City Jewish gangsters spanning over 40 years. Told mostly in flashbacks and flash-forwards, the movie centers on small-time hood David 'Noodles' Aaronson (Robert De Nero) and his lifelong partners in crime; Max (James Woods), Cockeye (William Forsythe) and Patsy (James Hayden) and their friends from growing up in the rough Jewish neighborhood of New York's Lower East Side in the 1920s, to the last years of Prohibition in the early 1930s, and then to the late 1960s where an elderly Noodles returns to New York after many years in hiding to look into the past. |
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The film follows a Jewish family living in Hungary through three generations, rising from humble beginnings to positions of wealth and power in the crumbling Austro-Hungarian Empire. The patriarch becomes a prominent judge but is torn when his government sanctions anti-Jewish persecutions. His son converts to Christianity to advance his career as a champion fencer and Olympic hero, but is caught up in the Holocaust. Finally, the grandson, after surviving war, revolution, loss and betrayal, realizes that his ultimate allegiance must be to himself and his heritage. |
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Eyal, an Israeli Mossad agent, is given the mission to track down and kill the very old Alfred Himmelman, an ex-Nazi officer, who might still be alive. Pretending to be a tourist guide, he befriends his grandson Axel, in Israel to visit his sister Pia. The two men set out on a tour of the country during which, Axel challenges Eyal's values. |
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Learn basic travel phrases in Hebrew. |
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Collection of Chanukah videos, games, recipes and how-to clips for the family. |
*** NOTE ALL MOVIE NOTES ARE PROVIDED BY AND COPYRIGHTED BY IMDB.COM
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