The official opening program will be the premiere of acclaimed documentary director Ran Tal\u2019s The Sixteenth Sheep: The Reunion, about the return to the stage of one of the most beloved song projects in Israeli history, which turned into an unexpected success.<\/p>\n
The Sixteenth Sheep is an album created 48 years ago through the collaboration of author\/lyricist Yehonatan Geffen and musician\/composer Yoni Rechter.<\/p>\n
ASSI DAYAN in \u2018Life as a Rumor,\u2019 a film devoted to his life. (credit: Yakov Agor\/Courtesy of the National Library of Israel)<\/p>\n
They set poems by Geffen about a child who can\u2019t sleep to music, and the original album, an enduring classic that children today know as well as the adults who grew up with it, was performed and recorded by Rechter with Gidi Gov, Yehudit Ravitz, and David Broza.<\/p>\n
At the height of the war, Rechter, Gov, Ravitz, and Broza came together for what was initially planned as a couple of performances, but it turned into a sensation that was extended to include many appearances.<\/p>\n
DocuText will close on August 20 with Tomer Heymann\u2019s 2003 documentary Aviv, a portrait of Aviv Geffen<\/a>, Yehonatan Geffen\u2019s son, which was made when the singer-songwriter marked a decade of extraordinary fame. Twenty-three years after the film\u2019s release, the screening will be followed by a live outdoor performance by Geffen and his band, HaTa\u2019uyot.<\/p>\n Festival to place emphasis on writers and their archives<\/strong><\/p>\n Several of the festival\u2019s most intriguing events this year focus on writers and their archives.<\/p>\n Things Were Like That, directed by Adi Arbel, turns to the life and work of celebrated Israeli novelist Meir Shalev, who died in 2023. It tells much of his life story through his books, recordings, and personal archive. The August 19 screening will be accompanied by An Israeli Novel, a special display of items from Shalev\u2019s archive at the library.<\/p>\n The library\u2019s archives will also take center stage in connection with Life as a Rumor, the 2013 documentary by Adi Arbel and Moishe Goldberg, in which the late actor\/director Assi Dayan recounts his turbulent life in his own distinctive voice.<\/p>\n Before the August 19 screening, the library will present Assi\u2019s Drafts, a series of displays featuring selected items from Dayan\u2019s archive.<\/p>\n Before the screening of LAISHA \u2013 The Story of a Women\u2019s Magazine, Anna Somershaf\u2019s documentary about the famous Israeli magazine, audiences can take part in the Can You Hear My Voice? tour, devoted to writings by women preserved in the National Library.<\/p>\n The tour will feature manuscripts, early editions, and other works that show how women gradually established a place in Hebrew and Jewish literary<\/a> culture. The film itself examines the sometimes contradictory role Laisha has played in both reflecting and shaping the lives of Israeli women.<\/p>\n DocuText festival to feature a number of English-language pieces<\/strong><\/p>\n THE FESTIVAL features a few English-language works.<\/p>\n Gaylen Ross\u2019s Sapiro v. Ford: The Jew Who Sued Henry Ford, screening on the festival\u2019s opening day, tells the remarkable and surprisingly little-known story of Aaron Sapiro, a Jewish lawyer and organizer who took on automobile magnate Henry Ford over the antisemitic attacks published in Ford\u2019s newspaper, The Dearborn Independent.<\/p>\n Sapiro filed a libel suit against one of the richest and most influential men in America, turning their confrontation into a David-and-Goliath legal battle over antisemitism, propaganda, and the accountability of the powerful. Actor Ben Shenkman gives voice to Sapiro\u2019s own words in the film.<\/p>\n Safe Room, directed by Haley Geffen, is another mostly English-language documentary centered on an Israeli story. It recounts how, during a single harrowing day on October 7, a doctor and his wife sheltered four families, creating an unexpected community in the midst of extraordinary danger.<\/p>\n The August 17 screening will be followed by a Q&A with Geffen and Tamar Schlesinger, one of the film\u2019s participants.<\/p>\n In We Met at Grossinger\u2019s, director Paula Eiselt looks back at the legendary Grossinger\u2019s resort in New York\u2019s Catskills, once the crown jewel of the \u201cBorscht Belt.\u201d<\/p>\n At a time when discrimination restricted where American Jews could vacation and socialize, Grossinger\u2019s became both a refuge and a cultural institution, welcoming guests and performers from across American public life. The film uses the resort\u2019s history to explore immigration, Jewish identity, belonging, and the longing for a place that can feel like home.<\/p>\n Another literary documentary, having its Israeli premiere, is Siri Hustvedt \u2013 Dance Around the Self, a portrait of the Norwegian-American novelist and essayist. The film traces Hustvedt\u2019s journey from Minnesota to New York and examines her intellectual and personal partnership with the late novelist Paul Auster, who was a distant relative of Daniel Auster, Jerusalem\u2019s first Jewish mayor.<\/p>\n The festival also includes The Campaign, directed by Kari Hollend and Cristina Bishai, an investigation of the battle over narratives about Israel, Gaza<\/a>, and the Jewish people that has played out through social media and other media since October 7. The August 19 screening will be followed by a discussion in English with Hollend and Israeli digital advocates.<\/p>\n The documentary Shalom, directed by Meital Zvieli, is set in Jerusalem and approaches the impact of war from an unexpected angle. Its central character is Shalom, a rhinoceros at Jerusalem\u2019s Biblical Zoo, whose caregivers include Rushdi, a Palestinian Muslim, and Gilad, an Israeli Jew.<\/p>\n Other highlights include Jane Elliott Against the World, about the American educator whose famous classroom exercise on prejudice made her a controversial figure in the struggle against racism; A Goodnight Kiss, a portrait of Holocaust survivor, literary scholar, and human-rights activist Irena Veisaite; Ivry Who?, about legendary Israeli violinist Ivry Gitlis; and The Orchestra, which takes viewers behind the scenes with the Orchestre de Paris and conductor Klaus M\u00e4kel\u00e4.<\/p>\n This year\u2019s DocuText features an especially interesting and diverse program this year.<\/p>\n