Chair's Message

To all our sponsors, Patron Circle Members, long-time supporters, and new friends

On behalf of the Toronto Jewish Film Foundation Board of Directors, welcome to the 27th Toronto Jewish Film Festival – 2019!!

As you will see in the following pages, our discerning programmers have once again curated an entertaining and thought-provoking eleven days of film for us to share: 90 films, screened at six locations, with guest artists
and scholars, Skype interviews with filmmakers, panels and co-presenters and, of course, our ever-expanding audience, including the many students who attend FilmMatters, our free educational outreach programme for elementary and secondary schools.

Since 1993, the Toronto Jewish Film Foundation has been bringing the Toronto Jewish and wider community together to share in the magic of feature and documentary films
of Jewish import from Canada and around the world. Our Festival has touched so many — eliciting smiles, laughter, tears, and no surprise, discussion. This was always, and still remains, the goal of the dedicated organizers, programmers and board members. We will watch Jewish- content documentaries and features from around the globe: documentaries that help us understand and try

to make sense of this world; features that take us to new places and introduce us to fictional characters who become alive and who teach us about ourselves.

I am writing this greeting ten weeks before our Festival begins, in mid-February, when Netflix, the streaming behemoth, has just announced the leasing of two very large studio spaces in Toronto. As a peripheral member
of the Toronto artistic community, I do of course celebrate the creation of what is being touted as over 1200 jobs. But at the same time, I, like many of you, ponder the impact these new entertainment distribution technologies have already had on our film-going practices and the

role they will play in the future. The new media world has prompted TJFF’s brilliant creation of j-flix.com (our free online streaming platform), whose value is undeniable. However, even though the screens in our homes have, for many, become very significant and often necessary part of our lives, I am certain none of us wants to give up the experience of gathering in an auditorium, to share “the bigger screen”, and your continued presence at both the Festival and TJFF year-round screenings will protect this shared value.

On behalf of all of us on the Board of Directors, I wish you another engaging, thought-provoking, informative and fun Festival. Please enjoy poring over these pages and making your choices of what to see. Thank-you for continuing

to share and enjoy this artistic journey, and may we all continue to go from strength to strength.