FICTION FILMS
PRODUCED AND DIRECTED BY HAIM
CALEV
Stored at the Israeli Television Film
Archives in
Gan Eden Teresin (Hebrew title) Full Film
Credits
Paradise Ghetto Theresienstadt (60 minutes) A painter in the ghetto draws sketches of Nazi atrocities, in order to expose the German hoax about the ‘Model Jewish Ghetto of Theresienstadt’. Her daughter, Irena smuggles the drawings out of the ghetto and hands them over to Czech partisans. As the Nazis get hold of the drawings, Irena does not admit that she is the smuggler and three innocent friends of hers are executed in her place. Presented as the stream of consciousness of a girl in Tel Aviv today, while she is playing the main role in the opera Brudibar, previously performed by children in Theresienstadt. (Originally broadcast on Israeli television, April 1992)
Erika (Hebrew
title) Full Film Credits
Erika (30 minutes) A young Dutch woman settles in an Israeli kibbutz after having traveled around the world. Having encountered loneliness and suffering everywhere, she clutches on to values of collective involvement as the only way of life she wants to live. Cast to play the role of the biblical character of Ruth in a film produced by a kibbutz member, she uses her own life experience in her performance. A comparison of attitudes and values between the biblical age and modern times evolves, raising moral questions and irony. (Originally broadcast on Israeli television, May 1991)
Sinamey
Dereh (Hebrew title) Full Film Credits
Road Signs (30 minutes) Story of a bright young man, considered to be extremely selfish and money oriented. After he falls in action as a soldier, it is discovered that he used to donate in secret large amounts of money - which he earned as a computer programmer - to a group of scouts in a poverty stricken area. (Originally broadcast on Israeli television, April 1991)
Sodo
shel Arik (Hebrew title) Full Film Credits
Arik's Secret (30 minutes) Graduation process of Arik, falsely accused of steeling money and unjustly persecuted. He admits a theft that he never committed as an experiment to cope with a challenging situation and to embarrass his accusers who know the truth. (Originally broadcast on Israeli television, September 1990)
Sipur
Ahava (Hebrew title) Full Film Credits
A Love Story. Based on a Talmudic legend (30 minutes) A relationship between a rich and spoiled young woman and an illiterate shepherd, Akiva. Excited by his potential mental powers, she marries him despite her father's anger. He disinherits her and she devotes her life to the shepherd, who becomes the greatest scholar and leader of his time. Filmed through a special animation technique. (Originally broadcast on Israeli television, May 1990)
Monith
Zehuba (Hebrew title) Full Film Credits
Yellow Cab (30 minutes) A
flower-store owner, persecuted by income tax authorities, decides to emigrate
to the
Ha-Nitzahon
shel Barak (Hebrew title) Full Film Credits
The Victory of Barak (30 minutes) A true and equal friendship between a blind young man, Barak and a sighted girl, Orna is interpreted by a journalist as an act of altruistic devotion. Orna is interviewed on television and collaborates with her interviewers, who glorify her for her deeds, thus reinforcing wrong stereotypes about people who are deprived of sight. (Originally broadcast on Israeli television, December 1989)
Ha-Pardess
shel
Grand Father's Orchard (30 minutes) A farmer decides to uproot an orange orchard and build a profit making country club in its place. His father who planted the orchard with his own hands as a pioneer settler and his son join in vain forces to fight him. (Originally broadcast on Israeli television, October 1989)
Tzav
Kriya (Hebrew title) Full Film Credits
A Call. Based on the biblical story of Jonah (30 minutes) Too involved in his individualistic pursuits, Jonah refuses to accept God's mission to warn Ninveh's population of God wrath against their sins. Violently forced to accept his mission, he eventually reaches Ninveh and witnesses great social injustice. Deeply moved by the evils he sees around him, a prophecy of destruction arises out of his own emotions. Filmed through a special animation technique. (Originally broadcast on Israeli television, September 1989)
Hayat
Ha-Hosheh (Hebrew title) Full Film Credits
The Animal of Darkness (30 minutes) A war widow becomes involved with her fallen husband's best friend. It is betrayal for her little son, who fights his sorrow by inventing an imaginary animal of darkness, through which he communicates with his deceased father. (Originally broadcast on Israeli television, May 1989)
El
Ha-Thahana [Original title in English] Full
Film Credits
To the Station. Based on a fragment in Kafka's diary (10 minutes) A man cannot find the way to the railroad station. Realizing that may be late, he runs breathlessly to a policeman asking road instructions. "From me you want to learn the way?...Give it up, give it up", responds the agent and turns away in a sweep of great laughter.(Made in 1972 towards MFA in Film at Columbia University, New York City)
Missaviv
[Original title in English] Full Film Credits
Around (17 minutes) A young couple wins a lottery. Celebrating alone at home, they get drunk and have a vision in which they see themselves already old and still drinking champagne, after a life-time of material affluence and spiritual deprivation. The unearned affluence made them passive, spoiled, disinterested and bored. They challenge the young couple to face the the emptiness of free time awaiting them and find a purpose to validate their lives. (Made in 1973 towards the MFA in Film at Columbia University, New York City)
DOCUMENTARY
FILMS
PRODUCED AND DIRECTED BY HAIM CALEV
Stored at the Israeli Television Film
Archives in Jerusalem
Nekudat Mifne (Hebrew title) Full Film Credits
Turning Point (30
minutes) Stories of three immigrants from
Pthahim (Hebrew
title) Full Film Credits
State of Siege (30 minutes) The mental state of religious students, who feel threatened by a permissive and libertine world. They believe that their devotion to intensive studying will save humanity from decadence. (Originally broadcast on Israeli television, May 1983)
Laaloth
Ba-Homa (Hebrew title) Full Film Credits
Climbing a Wall (30 minutes) Life style of a fanatic Jewish sect, believing that the establishment of the State of Israel is a revolt against God. (Originally broadcast on Israeli television, April 1983)
Hithmodeduth
(Hebrew title) Full Film Credits
A Struggle (50 minutes) Four blind people tell of their struggle against stereotyped people around them, who treat them as second rate human beings, rather than as normal people who just cannot see. (Originally broadcast on Israeli television, December 1981)
Shesh-Esre
Be-Rishon (Hebrew title) Full Film Credits
Sixteen in Rishon (50 minutes) Attitudes and values of sixteen year-olds in a town of symbolic significance, one of the first settlement of Israeli pioneers. The youngsters' philistine values are diametrically opposed to the ideology of the original settlers of the site. (Originally broadcast on Israeli television, November 1980)
Bi-Zehutham
(Hebrew title) Full Film Credits
The Living and the Dead (50 minutes) Stories of people who owe their lives to friends, who have been killed while saving them in battle. (Originally broadcast on Israeli television, May 1979)