Zaharira Harifai

Meduzot (the Hebrew word for Jellyfish) tells the story of three very different Israeli women living in Tel Aviv whose intersecting stories weave an unlikely portrait of modern Israeli life. Batya, a catering waitress, takes in a young child apparently abandoned at a local beach. Batya is one of the servers at the wedding reception of Keren, a young bride who breaks her leg in trying to escape from a locked toilet stall, which ruins her chance at a romantic honeymoon in the Caribbean. One of the guests is Joy, a Philippine chore woman attending the event with her employer, and who doesn't speak any Hebrew (she communicates mainly in English), and who is guilt-ridden after having left her young son behind in the Philippines.

The last play directed by Hanoch Levin. The plot follows three grieving characters: The Old Man, The Mother, and The Mule Driver, as they look for remedy from passers-by and confront the realities of death and the loss of their loved ones. Set in a small, desolate village, the play explores their struggles to find meaning in life amid sorrow; a poignant tale on mortality and the human condition.

The story of Israeli naval commandos, one of whose celebrated fighters tragically didn’t return from his last mission. In his will, he asks his wife to meet and date another young fighter, hoping she’ll continue her life. After some time, she decides to try and fulfil his wishes. The romance between her and the young soldier blossoms until he’s called to brave combat in the field.

A group of soldiers is sent to moshav for a few days of vacation. Or, maybe, not so vacation...

In this Israeli comedy, a father is afraid that after having sired eight daughters, that he will never produce a son.

A burlesque fantasy about a fountain-of-youth pill and its effects on Getz, a down-and-out Tel Aviv night-club singer. After taking this much sought after pill, Getz becomes the epitome of youthful energy, and therefore a teen idol, a symbol of beauty and youth, up to the cathartic ending of the movie.

A documentary on the events leading to the six day Arab-Israeli War of 1967, consisting of preexisting archival footage, incident re-creations, and interviews with military personnel.

A Jewish woman is recruited to help track down a German commander who was her former husband.

A comic and episodic satire, the film uses improvisation to illustrate the clash between fantasy and reality in real life. Although conceived in the style of Mekas’ “Hallelujah the hills” (1962), it’s an authentically Israeli satire, an openly rebellious and individualistic expression that poked fun at the sacred myths of earlier zionist films. The technique of film within the film is used to portray cinema as reflection of the imagination, a miracle based on dreams and fantasies that take on concrete characteristics – parallel to the miracle of Israel, the dream that has become reality. Although not a commercial success, its importance is beyond any measure, though it remains a unique experiment, boldly uncommercial and subversive, out of any context in that patriotic, ideological epoch.

About a year after the [Adolph] Eichmann trial, director and local industry pioneer, Natan Gross, explores the traumas of the Holocaust for the first time in Israeli film. Actor, Shimon Yisraeli, himself a pioneer of one-man shows on Israeli stages, wrote and spearheaded this one-man film which tells the story of Holocaust survivor, Emmanuel, who works as a security guard on a construction site where he grapples with all the memories of those dark times that come flooding back: the train journey, the Dachau death camp, his murdered paramour, and his former friend, Hans, who joined the Nazis and killed his father. He shows up at his childhood home where Hans now lives: following an encounter with a vicious dog, Emmanuel finds shelter in the house cellar where he bides his time – remembering, hallucinating, and working up an appetite for revenge. The Cellar won the Best Feature Film Suitable for Young People award at the Berlin International Film Festival.