Noah Stollman Movies
- 2008
Two young people are on very different missions on the backstreets of Jerusalem in this gritty drama from Israeli filmmaker Oded Davidoff. Seventeen-year-old Assaf (Yonatan Bar-Or) is working a boring summer job when he's given a seemingly impossible task -- finding the owner of a lost dog that's been found haunting the streets of Jerusalem. While Assaf has almost no idea of where to begin, by following the dog he begins to find clues that send him on the path to its master. The lost dog belongs to Tamar (Bar Belfer), a teenage girl who has come to Jerusalem in search of her brother, who fell in with a dangerous crowd among the city's criminal class. Tamar is a gifted singer and guitarist who makes ends meet by playing in the streets, but her impromptu performances attract the attention of Pesach (Tzahi Grad), who claims to look after the city's sidewalk performers. The truth is Pesach is a criminal who charges buskers for the right to perform in the best spots in town and all but holds them hostage in a rundown hostel he's set up from them. As Assaf tries to reunite Tamar with her dog, she finds herself searching for her brother as well as a way out of Pesach's clutches. Mishehu Larutz Ito) Someone To Run With was screened in competition at the 2007 Miami International Film Festival. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Bar Belfer, Yonatan Bar Or, (more)
Author Yoram Kaniuk's celebrated 1971 novel concerning a charismatic yet questionably sane Holocaust survivor comes to the screen in this dark drama starring Jeff Goldblum, Willem Dafoe, and Derek Jacobi. In the years before World War II, Adam Stein (Goldblum) was a Berlin entertainer who thrilled audiences with extravagant circus acts and spectacular magic tricks. Later, when Hitler took power and Europe was plunged into chaos, Stein and his family were locked away in a concentration camp presided over by the sadistic Commandant Klein (Dafoe). The only reason Stein survived those dreadful years was because he managed to become the commandant's personal "dog," entertaining his captors even as his wife and daughter are marched off to die. Flash-forward to 1961, when Stein is a patient at an Israeli mental hospital for Holocaust survivors. Seemingly able to read minds, Stein confounds head doctor Nathan Gross (Jacobi) with the question "Who brought a dog in here?" Despite Gross' vehement denial that any such animal is on the premises, Stein soon tracks the scent to a young boy who has spent his entire youth locked in a basement and chained to a wall. Over time, Stein and the boy see in each other something undeniably familiar, and the two kindred spirits set out on a remarkable journey together. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Jeff Goldblum, Willem Dafoe, (more)
