Best Jewish Movies
Throughout its history, Hollywood has always been filled with famous Jewish directors, producers and cast. The first popular Jewish film made in the 20s, The Jazz Singer, is truly a classic masterpiece centered around an aspiring Jewish singer who tries to break into the show business. Hollywood has also brought us the epic movies that reenact famous Biblical tales, like The Ten Commandments and Ben Hur.
There are more recent yet still classic examples of Jewish movies created by artists whose Jewish identity has played an important role in their film making. One of them is Barbara Streisand's Yentl in which she portrays a young woman who dresses up as a man in order to be able to join a yeshivah and study the Torah.
Another famous Jewish film comes from the Jewish director Woody Allen who created Radio Days in 1987, a film that nostalgically examines the golden days of the radio. These movies have successfully given a voice to the Jewish way of life and gave stage to the infamous Jewish humor. They create the discourse around such prominent Jewish themes as the family and introduce to the world one of the most famous and influential Jewish archetypes, the Jewish mother.
Many Jewish movies are about the history of the Jewish people and culture. The Holocaust, the memory of the Holocaust and dealing with that memory have played a major role in the development of Jewish films. Jewish movies about the Holocaust have served as a way of dealing with the memory of the Holocaust while at the same time documenting and preserving it. The first movie made about World War Two was the political satire The Great Dictator (1940), created by Charles Chaplin. Made and released before the war was over, the film reportedly upset Hitler.
Other movies about the Holocaust that have imprinted their marks on the history of Jewish film and the movie include Shoah (1985), Claude Lanzmann's 9 ½ hour long documentary, Sophie's Choice starring Meryl Streep, and of course, Steven Speilberg's Schindler's List (1993).
The latter masterpiece which delivers the story of the Jewish experience during the Holocaust so poignantly and authentically has received a world-wide recognition reaching a wide international audience. Equally noted should be such foreign movies as Europa Europa and Life is beautiful (LaVita a Bela) who brought Roberto Benigni its Oscar in a foreign movie category.
No doubt, these movies have helped to raise international awareness and caused many people around the world to see the Holocaust as a human catastrophe that has touched every person in the world. Jewish movies dealing with the Holocaust from the last decade have also touched on the experience of the second and third generation of the Holocaust. One of the most popular themes explored is the hiding of the Nazi war criminals after the war. Music Box, starring Jessica Lang, tells the story of a young lawyer whose father is accused of war crimes.
But don’t get the wrong impression that Jewish movies are always serious and somber. There are many widely-known and loved Jewish comedies. In fact, did you know that the international hit Dirty Dancing is one of them?