Film
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Culture ‘The Automat’ remembers when a nickel could buy the American dream
It was my grandmother who tipped me off to “The Automat,” a new documentary about the rise and fall of Horn & Hardart restaurants. It’s no wonder why. These eateries, which for over a century drew a diverse crowd of New Yorkers and Philadelphians with the promise of cheap, quality food and mechanical pageantry, seem…
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Culture Woody Allen’s latest is playing in a New York theater — but is anybody going to see it? Anybody?
On Tuesday I opted to spend a gorgeous afternoon in New York City going to a movie. The movie was “Rifkin’s Festival,” Woody Allen’s latest and a film that presently has a 42% on Rotten Tomatoes with a 50% audience score. Given this tepid reception, I wondered who was going to see Allen’s film, which…
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Culture 2022’s Oscar nominees are full of Jewish connections
This week’s parsha concerns God’s instructions to the Israelites in the wilderness on the design of priestly temple garments, how to properly light the menorah and how to build the golden altar of incense. So perhaps it’s fitting that the Moses-y desert parable “Dune” is now nominated for the Oscar gold in costume design, cinematography…
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Culture Is ‘Rifkin’s Festival’ Woody Allen’s love letter to cinema — or something more cynical?
“Rifkin’s Festival,” Woody Allen’s 49th feature, has a marketing problem. I’m not really alluding to the obvious issues. Not the HBO series about the alleged – and denied by Allen – sexual abuse of his daughter Dylan Farrow (full disclosure, I was a talking head in said series). Or even something like the #MeToo press…
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Culture The Jewish mentor Sidney Poitier never got to thank
Sidney Poitier, the Oscar-winning actor, director and civil rights icon who died today at 94, often credited a more obscure figure for his success: an old Jewish waiter. When Poitier was a newly-arrived Bahamian in Queens, N.Y., washing dishes at a restaurant, and hoping to make it as an actor, he would bring newspapers to…
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Culture How a film lover from Kingston, New York, grew up to be the inimitable Peter Bogdanovich
Peter Bogdanovich, the bandana-throated, Oscar-nominated director-writer who was a bridge figure between New Hollywood and the Hollywood Golden Age has died at 82. Encompassing such classics as “The Last Picture Show,” “Paper Moon” and “What’s Up, Doc?” Bogdanovich’s career ranged from intimate dramas to broad screwball comedies. He later charmed new audiences as Dr. Melfi’s…
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Culture Pee-wee Herman, a Hallmark Hanukkah and more movies to watch this Christmas
This year for sure, we all fervently hoped we would be able to return to the dim, dank and sticky sanctuary of our local multiplex and engage in that most hallowed Jewish custom: A movie on Christmas. Man plans, Hashem laughs. With a new, super-transmissible variant of the coronavirus rampaging through the world, many still…
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Culture Was the movie that upended Steven Spielberg’s formula also his most autobiographical?
Editor’s Note: The director Steven Spielberg turns 75 on Dec. 18. To mark that momentous occasion, the Forward is running a series of essays reassessing his films. Read more of our “Spielberg at 75” series here. Audiences love Steven Spielberg for the same reason many cinephiles scorn him: his epic, unflagging earnestness. Critics and fellow…
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Fast Forward Why some Satmar Hasidic leaders endorsed Zohran Mamdani as mayor, stunning many Jewish voters
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Culture Mamdani’s first statement on antisemitism as mayor-elect got some weird pushback
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News How Mamdani became New York’s next mayor, with Jews divided between fierce opposition and fiery support
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Culture Mamdani quoted Eugene Debs in his victory speech — there’s a long Jewish history there
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News Scott Wiener, Jewish Democrat and critic of Israel’s war in Gaza, vies for Nancy Pelosi’s seat
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Opinion Why a concert hall should be the last place for a protest — particularly an antisemitic one like this
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Looking Forward What Hailey Bieber smoothies and instant matzo ball soup reveal about American Jewish taste
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Culture Mamdani’s first statement on antisemitism as mayor-elect got some weird pushback
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