Jewish Youth Life Stories Represented in NJFP

Citizen Film is “an independent documentary production company dedicated to telling personal stories with care and dignity.” One of their current projects is the New Jewish Film Project (NJFP), a part of the San Francisco Jewish Film Festival. The concept is that Jewish youth, kids 16–25 years of age, create their own documentaries. These are from their perspective, centered on what it means to be coming of age as a Jew in America. This is an ongoing project started in 2002 and in the past, these films have been shown internationally. The theme of this year’s documentaries is “half–remembered stories.” Attempting to merge new technology and old stories, NJFP is trying to exhibit these videos online as well.

As anyone who enjoys the benefits of Hulu knows, online TV is accessible and enjoyable. By putting these videos online with their New Media Initiative, NJFP is trying to reach out to all the young Jewish adults who are interested in and curious about defining themselves. Jewish stories are part of a rich oral tradition, and one might infer from the title “People of the Book” that literature is a big deal in Jewish culture too. But as everything adjusts to modern times, so must ancient practices. Documentary filmmaking is not only a valuable experience for the talented people chosen, but it is an opportunity for other Jewish youth to experience Judaism in the media they are most comfortable with — television.

The NJFP program was founded by Sam Ball, a filmmaker who was awarded a grant for Jewish social entrepreneurs. Also working with the young documentary creators, are experienced filmmakers Katharine Stilley Steiner and Debra Chasnov. An interesting component of the documentaries is the advice of Jeremy Dauber, who suggests reading Jewish texts that apply to each film. This is another way to carry ancient ideas into modern Judaism.

Seven young adults from around the Bay Area were chosen, most selecting to make documentaries. Sam Ball said that the films are a way for kids to define themselves. Many of the filmmakers orient their films towards their relatives and their stories. He said it was enormously powerful “to realize that your grandmother is a person and not just your grandmother.” Helping kids talk about themselves in an authentic and original way is the focus of the project. Ball explained the group was not necessarily comprised of “committed Jews,” the project will help them realize who they want to be when taking into account their Judaism.

“Storytelling comes first,” said Zoe Pollak, a BHS senior in the program. She explained that storytelling was an indirect approach to Judaism, and that project is Jewish because of its searching, intellectual manner, a cultural association most Jews have.

Pollak is the only teen creating a multimedia project instead of a film. Her take on “half–remembered stories” is playing with memory, time travel, and nostalgia. By time travel we’re not talking about Michael J. Fox and Plutonium, but memory as a form of re-experiencing something. “People think that the past is so objective and set in stone, but it’s really not,” Pollack said.

She explained how her website will work, “When you open the page, you’ll see a clock and you can click on any of the numbers. Say you click on three, you might see a video of children playing. It will be mute, but there will be music playing over it. Now on another number you might have the same video with different music, and that might have totally different associations for you. And each time you go back to the home page, the numbers will have changed order, and that’s sort of playing with time travel too.” Pollak said she chose time travel because she has recently become very interested in the topic. “Now that I’m getting ready to go off to college, sometimes I just wish I was little again.” Pollak says she realized that ages have great value and that as a little kid she wouldn’t be able to enjoy and understand things she does now. In this way, the project has been a great way for her to think about this and be productive. Pollak has found the project both interesting and disciplining.

NJFP also plans to use other types of online media like Facebook and blogging sites. Because the program is connected to the San Francisco Jewish Film Festival, it can also use resources from that film program. The Contemporary Jewish Museum has already offered to exhibit these documentaries, as well as other multimedia art pieces that are part of the program. Having these well–crafted and important thoughts available to the Jewish community is a gift.