community resources where obstacles are put displaced homemakers. Currently, the U.S. in the way of client goal realization. Senate and House of Representatives are both The Image of the Jew and Israel in Contemporary Media considering a Displaced Homemaker's Act. In 8. Follow Up and Evaluation Services Julius Schatz The program should have provisions for on­ the near future, we are likely to see significant Director, Commission on Jewish Life and Culture, going contact with clients after job placement activity in both the public and private sectors American Jewish Congress; Chairman, Task Force on Media, or closure. Some women may experience job in the development of programs serving this National Jewish Community Relations Advisory Council, New York adjustment problems in relation to employer specific client group. It is important that the Jewish Vocational expectations or unanticipated circumstances in The medium . . . is the most powerful communicator, influencer, impacter—salesman and Services become part of the mainstream their work life. Routine follow-up of all cases propaganda and information dispenser. on a prescribed interval is mandatory. When efforts to serve the displaced homemaker. We necessary, clients should be permitted re- have the natural constituencies and client We hope that this brief article will attempt planes, from the gas jets to the laser beam; access to any part of the program. groups who will require this service. Our skills to probe for answers to a number of important from coal-burning to atomic energy, we must All of us involved in social service delivery and long experience in the areas of counseling, questions. gasp at the implications. We no longer live in systems must become increasingly concerned vocational assessment, training, job develop­ How do we see the image of the Jew and closed, protective societies. with program cost-effectiveness. An evalua­ ment and job placement are central to delivery Israel in film today? What is your definition of Satellites in the sky. Radar and dark light; tion of this kind of comprehensive program of service to this group. Our expertise with a Jewish film? Is there a successful commercial sonar in the deepest of oceans; unbelievable must be built in which examines service handicapped and special populations are market and are there audiences for Jewish and instruments that see and hear us without our indices, costs of program, impact on clients in nationally recognized. Finally, we possess the Israeli firms? What is the scene among young knowledge. Our personal events are no longer both economic and personal terms, and input creative skills and management techniques Jewish filmmakers? What are they up to? sacred. The very events of life; its tragedies, its from consumers using the service. necessary to carve out an effective response to What does the future spell? joys, its heartbreaks and its loves all reveal Within a handful of years, the problems of this newly recognized problem. I would hope On a recent NBC-TV special, Orson Welles themselves on the TV screens, on the movie displaced homemakers have evoked tremen­ that within the JVS field, we can shortly see made a significant and startling observation screens right in our very homes, right before dous national awareness and response. Over agencies developing such programs using all of that one showing of a theatrical feature on TV our eyes. Our families, our children, our 15 states have legislated programs to serve the resources available to them. is seen by more people than would see almost grandchildren—all of us—are the captives of 500 showings in theatres all over the world for the media: film and TV and radio. the past 50 years. The medium is no longer the message. It is The recent NBC-TV series on the Holocaust the most powerful communicator, influencer, amplifies this powerful role of TV. It is impacter-salesman and propaganda and infor­ estimated that over 100,000,000 persons mation dispenser. watched this drama-documentary. In a recent study of the United States, it was The audience for television, the ultimate determined that 97 percent of all homes have mass medium is not one audience but many. TV sets; 41 percent have two or more TV sets; Four such audiences are women, blacks, the 64 percent have color TV sets. An article in the poor and the elderly. We can conclude from New York Times states that most children are many studies of TV entertainment and happy at home but fear the outside world. The commercials that for the past 25 years Institute for Survey Research at Temple portrayals of women, the poor, minorities and University surveyed 2,220 children 7-22 years the elderly have been relatively few, except for old. One quarter of the children were stereotypes. Perhaps "the new television" of frightened of TV programs where people shoot the past few years may herald a different and fight. And heavy viewers were twice as pattern for the future. Heavy viewers have frightened. TV violence must be checked by been found to be more likely to perceive the more than Sesame Street. world as resembling TV drama more than real A Variety survey on 3/2/77 reported that life. TV violence is up at the highest level since We live in an age of terrifying technological 1967. At the Annenberg School of Com­ achievement. If we contemplate the vast munications, University of Pennsylvania re­ changes in our society during the past half searchers found the big jump in violence century from the wagon to the supersonic during the family hour. Non-whites and

290 291 women are the most likely victims of violence. public service TV, cable TV and home account of the ordeals of a French family Do You Know Kappler? A new East The average American household spends subscription TV. under the heels of Nazi occupation. German film about the Gestapo chief in more than seven hours watching TV. By 9:00 We are in the midst of the most profound Black Thursday. The definitive film that Rome. p.m. 70 percent of all Americans are watching media-cultural revolution. The American describes the round up of the Jews in Paris by And Coming. A new Film Polski pro­ TV. Jewish community will have to recognize these the Nazis and their French lackeys. duction, The Life of Dr Janusz Korczak, The average American child will have revolutionary facts and face up to the great Der Martyr (The Martyr). A film about the directed by Andrzei Wajda, Poland's most viewed 15,000 hours of TV by the time he or challenges of communication technology. If life of Dr. Korczak, the dedicated Warsaw prolific producer. she has been graduated from high school as we don't we will be swamped, literally Ghetto doctor and his orphaned children. Voyage of The Damned. It is a chilling compared to an exposure of 11,000 hours of drowned, in other kinds of sights and sounds. Pouquoi L 'Israel. A French film shown to retelling in fictional form of the historic formal classroom instruction. During the past two years there has been a packed houses in Paris. This three-and-one- voyage of the ship The St. Louis carrying They will have witnessed some 18,000 significant rise in the production and showing half hour documentary is probably the best hundreds of German Jews who were the pawns murders and countless detailed brutal inci­ of films that relate to Jewish life, Jewish film about Israel. in the brutal game of the Nazis. dents of robbery, arson, bombing, forgery, characters and Jewish concerns. Among these My Michael. A New Dan Wolman feature IdiAmin Dada. The authentic picture of the smuggling, mugging, beating, and torture— have been a number of positive films pro­ based on the Hebrew classic. brutal Ugandan despot. If it were fiction, it averaging approximately one per minute in the jecting honest and objective images of Jewish A Memory of Justice, by the brilliant would be acclaimed as a comic masterpiece, standard TV cartoon for children under the life, values and history. Some of the better documentary filmmaker Marcel Ophuls (The but it is all truth and terrifying. age of ten. There is an average of six times feature films are: Sorrow and the Pity), this excellent three-hour Marathon Man. A confusing but chilling more violence during one hour of children's Lies My Father Told Me, starring Yossie documentary about the Nuremberg trials and story of a chase for a master Nazi "biggie" TV than there is in one hour of adult TV. Yadin of Israel, dramatizing the warm and their aftermath has been distributed by filled with brutality and terror. Twenty-five percent of the TV industry's touching relationship between a seven-year-old Paramount Pictures. Operation Thunderbolt, Rescue at Entebbe. profit comes from children's programming Jewish boy and his 75-year-younggrandfather; Special Section, a new film by the dis­ A dramatic reenactment of this historic event which is seven percent of the total. set in the Montreal immigrant community of tinguished producer director Costa-Gavras produced by Menachem Golan in Israel. More than $400,000,000 is spent on TV ad­ the 1920's. ("Z" and "Siege"). This is almost a The Spy Who Came From Israel. A film vertising directed at children. The Code of Hester Street. This outstanding full length "documentary" filming of the events in story of the master spy from Israel caught and Hammarubai in 2250 BC made selling film describes the effort and heartache of occupied France in 1941 when French Fascist executed in Syria in 1965. (Eli Cohen). something to a child or buying something from immigrant Jews in the early part of this collaborators and their Nazi bosses prostituted Eagle In The Sky. A projected film based on a child without power of attorney punishable century to adjust to the new life and problems the legal-judicial system to serve the Nazi a love story in an Israel setting. by death. Our children are exposed to more in America. cause. 21 Hours at Munich. Based on the Munich than 350,000 TV commercials by the time they The 81st Blow. A powerful full length docu­ La Rue Haute (The High Wall), a Belgian Olympic massacre. reach age 18. mentary of the sadistic, brutal events that product starring the French actress, Annie Homage to Chagall — 77ze Life of Marc Cinema also has a heavy influence on the mark the Nazi step-by-step destruction of Jews Cordy. This is a superb and little noticed Chagall. A Canadian film, a full length feature adolescent and young adult. Commercial and Jewish life in Eastern Europe and in the Holocaust film. released in 1977 on the artist's 90th birthday. theatrical films have grossed more than $2.3 ghettos. It features the legendary heroism of 777e Dreamer, an interesting and sensitive But lest we become euphoric about these billion dollars in 1977—Jaws, 150 million; the Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto. art film by the young Israeli director-producer, goodies on celluloid let us be reminded that Towering Inferno, 55 million; Benji and The Adventures of "Rabbi" Jacob. One of Dan Wolman. there are those films that are problematic, bad Young Frankenstein, 30 million and God­ the funniest French films that devotes con­ The Confrontation. A Swiss German film and banal. These include: father II, 29 million. Star Wars will reach an siderable footage to Jews and Jewish life in production based on the true story of the A proposed film on The Sex Life of Jesus. estimated gross of 250 million plus. More than Paris. assassination of a Swiss Nazi gauleiter. Israel has refused permission to the Danish 25 million persons paid to see film in theatres Lacombe Lucien. Another of the great Madame Rosa. The Oscar award film producer to shoot in Israel. Now brought to in 1977, each week; every week. French films that deals with the Nazis and starring Simone Signoret. A sensitive and U.S.A. for production. The power of TV and films is growing by their French Fascist allies in the countryside. eloquent "documentary" of a relationship The Passover Plot, based on the Hugh leaps and bounds and its glorious future grows Jews play prominent roles. between a Jewish holocaust survivor and an Schoenfeld book. This film which we pre­ rosier and more lucrative as super productions L'Chaim — to Life. Produced by Harold Arab street urchin. viewed with our Catholic and Protestant film are mounted and produced. Mayer for Women's Ort, this film succeeds in Jacob the Liar. The East German produc­ colleagues is offensive to Christian sensibilities Home video discs will allow the average capturing the flavor and richness of early tion based on the story of Jewish life in the and disturbing to many of us in the Jewish home to purchase a unit for several hundred American Jewish immigrant life and leads us Nazi occupied ghetto of Lodz. community. Banned in Israel and offensive to dollars plus individual metal discs that will right to the birth of Israel. Number Our Days. The Oscar award the Christian community. house an entire, full length film for $10-15. Les Violons du Bal. A sensitive film; an documentary about Jewish elderly in Cali­ The other side of the coin includes the Just conjecture what this means, added to autobiography translated into a fictional fornia. negative films about Jews. Some of these are:

292 293 Swastika, a film showing the "human" side Germany are on the way: network. In fact they are involved with the Israel, Holocaust and a quarterly Round-Up of Hitler and his cronies. — Death is My Trade — the story of the most advanced and sophisticated technology— of information. I see dozens of young Children of Rage, a film that features Arab Commandant of Auschwitz even using satellite relays for their recent filmmakers. I spend time with many, many and Israel relationships. Stiff, wooden and — Hitler in US Bishop's Conference. Jewish media professionals. I provide infor­ — The Red Nights of the Gestapo favorable to the Arab side. And the irony of ironies—the Jewish com­ mation and aid to agencies, institutions, — Hitter — A Career, based on the book Kfar Kassem, a Lebanese production. A munity from which sprang the innovations, the synagogues and even places like Germany, Joachim Fest and playing' to packed founders of the film industry, where are we? pictorial distortion of what took place in this houses in Germany Belgium, France, England, Israel and South — We have no national film and broadcasting village in 1956. New 16mm Feature Films Africa and Australia. I have been involved in The Messiah, a new Rossellini film-in-the- — After Mein Kamf, 45 minutes center Film Forums, Yiddish Film Festivals, and making about the life of Jesus. These films are — The California Reich, 60 minutes — We have no real interest and involvement Middle East Film Festival, Israel Film Festi­ always troublesome. — Hitler Jungle QUEX, 102 minutes with the advanced, new technology: News vals, Bicentennial Festivals and advice to TV Land of Promise, a Polish prize-winning — AlFathe, 80 minutes on TV, Home Video, Disc, the Media and Film personnel. Just recently CBS-TV film by Andrzej Wajda. Recently won the top — Revolution Until Victory, 52 minutes Room Concept, Videotape and Cable TV called about film on Golda Meier; Nova of award in the Chicago Film Festival. Its Jewish — We Demand Freedom, 55 minutes and the use of the optical fiber. WGBH in Boston called about film about characters are stereotypes from the classical — To Live in Freedom — We published a Film Review but it dies Einstein—March 1979 will be his Centennial. anti-Semitic mold. Based on a Polish classic A new film, Love Those Arabs, 16mm, after a year for want of a $ 15,000 budget. I coordinate previews of commercial and about life in Lodz. In today's political climate, color, 28 minutes, comes with an Arab Case — We had a National Council on Jewish 16mm films of Jewish content and interest, this film adds fuel to the fire. Packet. Its theme is: "Have you neglected the Audio-Visual materials about Israel and related concerns. But ob­ The Serpent's Egg, produced by Ingmar Arabs, too? After seeing this film, every stop — We had Encounter Films, New Jewish viously, this is not and cannot be a at a gas station should be a reminder—yes, Bergman based on life in Berlin in 1923, at a Media, even Jewish Media and the one-two-three and five-person responsibility. even a call to prayer for the Arabs." time when Hitler's Legions were street gangs. NJCRAC Task Force all dead or at the The continuing crises: Israel, Soviet Jewry The Black Banana, an independent film What is on the Jewish Scene today in Media? threshold of extinction. and the rise of neo-Nazism require a larger, produced in Israel and not yet released in the I have tried with the help of a handful of centralized, well supported National Media I. The Jewish community—that is the U.S.A. It is banal and insensitive to Jewish life colleagues in the Jewish world, Joel Ollander, Center with all the tools and outreach organized institutional Jewish community— styles. A comedy which becomes a travesty. Mort Yarmon, Fran Rosenberg, Sam Elfert potential to support it. seems not seriously interested or concerned Black Sunday, based on the Munich and Bal Brickner to keep the flame alive. The need is clear—the urgency is great. It with the powerful force of media. massacres. It poses uncomfortable imbalance I maintain the only central library of infor­ needs will and affirmation and cries for our We are reactive to the media, when it deals between Israeli characters and the Arab mation and publish special bibliographies on support and involvement. with Israel, Zionism, Holocaust and Jewish characters. life, or if it is negative, like the PBS program Lieben-Camp, The Secret Records of the on Nazis and the Ku Klux Klan. Mad Nights of Adolph Hitler. Two of an Not only do we not have the structure, the oncoming onslaught of sado-masochistic films national coordinating centers in media like based on the Nazi experience. those of Protestants and Catholics, we have Shadows of the Angels, the film that caused even allowed those few media operations that Israel to withdraw from the Cannes Festival have struggled to serve the Jewish community because it is virulently anti-Semitic. to disintegrate. The Confessions of Winifred Wagner, a The National Council on Churches has a compelling, chilling two-hour interview with staffed Broadcasting and Film Commission. Richard Wagner's daughter-in-law, an unre­ They publish an excellent Film Information pentant, proud supporter of Hitler. Produced bulletin with periodic, in-depth feedback by Hand Jurgen Superberg, His new film, inserts on such subjects as Israel, Disarma­ Hitler, a film from Germany, running 7 hours ment, Humane treatment of Animals and most has already created disturbances and furor in recently on the NBC-TV Holocaust mini- Europe. series. A flock of neo-Nazi and sado-masochistic The U.S. Catholic Conference is a well films glorifying brutality and a growing list of staffed, centrally headquartered operation. Arab films filled with lies, distortions and They also publish a periodic film and broad­ anti-Semitism. casting review and maintain an excellent A Flock of Questionable Films out of West

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