The Boulder Jewish Film Festival Adds a 2nd Screening of Woody Guthrie Film

Tickets to the Boulder Jewish Film Festival went on sale last week and are going fast. Given the capacity of our venue and the high demand for the number of seats available, we anticipated that some films would sell out quickly.

Still, we were not expecting that our opening night film, “Dust Bowls and Jewish Souls: Another Side of Woody Guthrie,” would sell out in a matter of hours. Happily, we were able to add a second screening in the Grace Gamm Theater at the same time as the showing in the larger Gordon Gamm Theater. Both screenings are at 6:30 pm on Monday, October 26. Buy a ticket.

The simultaneous screenings will allow all ticket buyers to attend the opening night reception at 5 pm in the Dairy Arts Center Lobby. The reception includes live music by Jubilee Creek Klezmer and the kind of Jewish comfort food Woody Guthrie would have enjoyed at this beloved mother-in-law’s home in Coney Island in the 1940s. Also, all ticket buyers will receive a recorded zoom interview with director Seven Pressman conducted by BJFF Founding Director Kathryn Bernheimer.

While several of our other screenings are also sold out, including “Reading Lolita in Tehran,” tickets are still available for many films, including two of my personal favorites.

“To Kill a Nazi” is the most fascinating film in the festival, one that not only tells a mind boggling and inspiring true story but that weaves together many intersecting themes. Ticket buyers will receive a recorded interview with director Boaz Dvir. “A Burning Man,” an Israeli feature film which will be followed by a conversation with local parents with a child serving in the IDF, is similarly haunting. I still find myself thinking about this story of a father overcome by a feeling of helplessness as his son returns to active duty.

I also recommend three other award-winning international feature films.

In the German biographical drama “Rosenthal,” a popular entertainer faces a moral dilemma. Will he honor his Jewish heritage or meet the demands of his adoring public?

A blockbuster in France and the winner of the most audience awards at this year’s Jewish film festivals, “Once Upon My Mother” is based on the true story of a feisty Moroccan mother who becomes a zealous advocate for her disabled son.

In the multiple Israeli Oscar-winning drama “The Sea,” a Palestinian father frantically tries to find his son, who has gone dangerously astray. This beautifully crafted feature echoes the theme of parental devotion that runs through several of the illuminating stories we have chosen to tell at our annual exploration of the Jewish experience on screen.