The Israeli Film Academy awarded its annual prizes last night, and two films dealing with religious issues and produced by religious Jews won a total of six of them. Yosef Cider's "Medurat HaShevet" - Tribal Bonfire - won prizes for best film, best director, best screenplay, best editing, and best supporting actress. A hareidi-produced movie, "HaUshpizin" - The Sukkot Guests - won a prize, known affectionately as an Israeli Oscar, for best actor, awarded to Shuli Rand.
Some 36 Israeli movies, including 13 documentaries were nominated for prizes, and 14 prizes were awarded to nine films.
In his acceptance speech, Rand, who also wrote the film, said he first wished to thank "the Holy One, Blessed be He, in Whose honor I made the film." He also mentioned the saintly 18th-century Rabbi Nachman of Breslav and his own Yeshiva head, Rabbi Shalom Harosh of Jerusalem. He further thanked his director Gidi Dar, and his wife Michal who, like Shuli, is a recent returnee to observant Judaism, and who was the film's co-star.
On the other hand, one of the awardees actually dedicated his prize to "my friend, Tali Fahima" - the Israeli Jewess who is under house arrest for her role in aiding her boyfriend and arch-terrorist Zakarias Zubeidi of Jenin.
Cider's "Tribal Bonfire" centers around three religious women and their day-to-day problems. "The Sukkot Guests," a first in mainstream films in that it features a hareidi star and a hareidi plot, centers around a young and destitute yeshiva couple living in Me'ah She'arim whose prayers are answered when they are suddenly blessed with a windfall of charity money - as well as unexpected guests for the holiday: two old friends whom he hasn't seen since they sat in prison together years before. The movie received very positive reviews.
Some 36 Israeli movies, including 13 documentaries were nominated for prizes, and 14 prizes were awarded to nine films.
In his acceptance speech, Rand, who also wrote the film, said he first wished to thank "the Holy One, Blessed be He, in Whose honor I made the film." He also mentioned the saintly 18th-century Rabbi Nachman of Breslav and his own Yeshiva head, Rabbi Shalom Harosh of Jerusalem. He further thanked his director Gidi Dar, and his wife Michal who, like Shuli, is a recent returnee to observant Judaism, and who was the film's co-star.
On the other hand, one of the awardees actually dedicated his prize to "my friend, Tali Fahima" - the Israeli Jewess who is under house arrest for her role in aiding her boyfriend and arch-terrorist Zakarias Zubeidi of Jenin.
Cider's "Tribal Bonfire" centers around three religious women and their day-to-day problems. "The Sukkot Guests," a first in mainstream films in that it features a hareidi star and a hareidi plot, centers around a young and destitute yeshiva couple living in Me'ah She'arim whose prayers are answered when they are suddenly blessed with a windfall of charity money - as well as unexpected guests for the holiday: two old friends whom he hasn't seen since they sat in prison together years before. The movie received very positive reviews.