San Diego Jewish Film Festival offers 51 movies from 14 countries
February 6th, 2010 by Scott Marks
“A Matter of Size” is one of the hefty offerings at the San Diego Jewish Film Festival. (Photo courtesy of Menemsha Films)
San Diego’s longest-running film festival turns 20 this year. And what better way to celebrate than by showing more movies than ever before?
Slated for February 10-21, the San Diego Jewish Film Festival (SDJFF) promises films from 14 different countries. The combined number of shorts, documentaries and features totals an impressive 51.
“We started with four films,” Joyce Axelrod, the fest’s founder and former chairperson, laughingly recalls. “Even after the festival was well underway (co-founder) Lynette Allen and I never showed more than twenty or thirty films.”
It began as a modest series of film screenings held in a gymnasium and curated by Axelrod and Allen. At the time, there were only a handful of Jewish film festivals sprinkled across the country. If Axelrod’s tabulations are correct, there are currently 81 Jewish festivals in the U.S. and 130 worldwide.
San Diego’s fest found an early home at La Jolla’s Sherwood Auditorium in the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego. For the past several years, SDJFF’s flagship theater has been the AMC La Jolla 12.
This year’s venues also include the UltraStar Mission Valley Cinemas at Hazard Center and UltraStar Poway Creekside Plaza 10, the David & Dorothea Garfield Theatre at the Lawrence Family Jewish Community Center, and on the campus of San Diego State University at the “Not Quite Kosher Film Festival.”
For 13 years, running the festival was Axelrod’s all-consuming passion. Seven years ago, she handed the reigns over to Judy Friedel, who now acts as festival chairperson. Joyce still maintains a spot on the festival lineup. The Joyce Forum has become one of SDJFF’s most popular components.
It began as a birthday gift from her husband, Joe Fish.
Joyce Axelrod
“Joe made a gift to the Center for Jewish Culture, “Axelrod remembers. “He and (former festival director) Jacqueline Siegel knew of my interest in emerging filmmakers. They decided to establish the Joyce Forum, a festival-within-the-festival to show films created by budding talent. It was also a way for the industry to recognize them as up-and-coming filmmakers.”
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