Memorial Award
(1970–2004)
for best short film
David A. Stein
Memorial Award
(1970–2004)
This award is presented in memory of gifted Toronto filmmaker David A. Stein, who passed away in 2004 at age 34. The “Tzimmie” – named after his production company, Tzimmes Entertainment – is an annual $5,000 award given to the Director of the Best Documentary making its Canadian Premiere at the Toronto Jewish Film Festival. This award supports documentary filmmakers in creating works that would have interested David, and that carry on his passion for storytelling.
David A. Stein
Memorial Award
(1970–2004) Winner:
Directors: Itamar Alcalay & Meital Zvieli
JURY STATEMENT: "Every now and again, we come across a film that is able to do things differently and showcase daily life through a lens that offers an unusual and creative gaze. Such is the case with THE CAMERA OF DR. MORRIS. This is a film that takes us on a journey delving into the personal story of a family’s arrival in Israel from England using a rich treasure trove of 8mm film with drama and poignancy. Not only does the film provide an outsider’s take on a new and developing community, but it also delivers a highly creative statement about filmmaking, storytelling, and original use of archival footage."
Dr Paul de Silva is an award-winning screen media writer/director/producer, and educator, with extensive experience working for broadcast media, Government, educational and community organizations, in intercultural communication, and new project development in the cultural industries sector.
He was a Human Rights Officer with Ontario Human Rights Commission and a broadcast journalist and producer with the CBC and worked as a Audio/Visual Producer with the United Nations Environment Commission in New York and Nairobi, Kenya.
He has a PhD from the York – Ryerson Joint Programme in Communications and Culture. His areas of academic research interest and practice are the cultural politics and the political economy of screen media industries and the social and economic factors affecting post-colonial societies
Daniella Tourgeman Glass is employed as a Film Curator and Grant Writer at the Jerusalem Cinematheque-Israel Film Archive. Within this capacity, she serves as Artistic Director of the Jewish Film Department and Jerusalem Jewish Film Festival, as well as the institution’s International Relations Liaison, in the fields of international grant writing and fundraising for festivals, annual projects, and the Israel Film Archive. She has served on the grants committees of the Kroll Film Fund and was part of the Main Jury at the Bratislava Film Festival and the Religion Today Film Festival. Daniella holds a BA in Romance Languages and Comparative Literature from Brandeis University and an MA in Comparative Literature from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
Francine Zuckerman and her company Zfilms inc. have produced a wide range of films and television programs with an emphasis on adaptation from fiction and theatre, social documentary and performing arts. They have won numerous awards and their work has been recognized at film festivals around the world. Films include documentaries: HALF THE KINGDOM; EXPOSURE: environmental links to breast cancer with Olivia Newton-John. Other work includes: a Canada/New Zealand feature co-production PUNCH ME IN THE STOMACH based on the Off-Broadway play; the dramatic series THE ATWOOD STORIES and feature documentary WE ARE HERE. Their feature documentary AFTER MUNICH is now in distribution with Go2Films.
We are in development on an international feature documentary Canadian/ France co-production ALMA ROSE; a feature documentary Canadian/ New Zealand co-pro A PLACE CALLED HOME and a scripted tv series based on the celebrated writer Margaret Atwood’s first novel THE EDIBLE WOMAN.
The Micki Moore Award
The Micki Moore Award is a $5,000 prize presented to the Best Narrative Feature Film directed by a woman. “I think film is the highest form of art, combining so many disciplines; words, music, pictures, sets, costumes, continuity. A great director needs to be master of all, working to bring out the best in her cast and crew. With this award, I want to acknowledge that creativity, talent and tenacity. I hope this grant will help open one more door, remove one more obstacle, so that the winner of the Micki Moore Award can flourish and continue on her cinematic journey.” (Micki Moore)
The Micki Moore Award Winner:
Director: Florence Miailhe
JURY STATEMENT: “It took the jury less than five minutes to unanimously choose Florence Miailhe’s THE CROSSING as this year’s recipient of the Micki Moore Prize. Miailhe captured our hearts with this loving, expressionistic-animated interpretation of her grandmother’s own escape from Odessa back in 1905. Handled with a clever blurring of specific details of geography and culture, the hope and wonder of fairy tales while weaving real tragic events of our shared past, THE CROSSING is a brilliant testament of memory and storytelling while also acting as a cautionary tale for both young and old on the horrors of oppression and fascism throughout the world."
Ann Marie Fleming is a Vancouver-based Canadian filmmaker and artist who works in animation, documentary and live action dramatic genres.
Born in Okinawa of Australian and Chinese descent, her hybrid identity is reflected in her films which often deal with themes of family, history and memory. The Magical Life of Long Tack Sam pioneered photoshop techniques in documentary film. You Take Care Now is on the TIFF List of Essential Canadian Cinema. Her adaptation of Bernice Eisenstein’s I Was a Child of Holocaust Survivors received the J.I. Segal Award’s Michael Moskovitz Prize for best film on a Jewish theme. Window Horses was named the Best Animated Film at the Asia Pacific Screen Awards.
Orit was born in Israel in 1983. She graduated from the Jerusalem Sam Spiegel School with honors in 2012, winning her class’ ‘Promising Director’ Award.
Her diploma film Staring Match was screened in festivals all over the world, including: San Sebastian, Montreal, Munich and won the Grand Prix award at the Hangzhou Festival in China, Best Screenplay Award at Tel Aviv Student Film Festival, and an Honorable Mention at the Jerusalem Film Festival.
After graduating, Orit co-directed a documentary series for the Israeli Channel YES Doco; worked as a film facilitator and director for Israeli NGO, making films with at-risk youth; worked as a filmmaking teacher of groups of women in Acres and Givat Haviva.
She also conducted research for a documentary by the Oscar-award-winning director Alex Gibney, and wrote and directed two short fiction films – You Remain Silent, that was a part of the Abraham Heffner tribute Voice Over and premiered in Sarajevo and Jerusalem Film Festival 2018 and The MOMA, and Veil that that was selected to various festivals around the world including The Oslo Short Film Festival, Jerusalem Film Festival and Brussels Short Film Festival.
Her debut feature film Cinema Sabaya won Best Picture Award and Audience Award at the Jerusalem International Film Festival, as well as Best Picture at the Ophir Awards, the prizes of the Israeli Academy of Film and Television. The film received five awards in all--including the Best Picture Prize, Best Director for Rotem, and Best Supporting Actress for Joanna Said.. Cinema Sabaya is Orit’s debut feature film.
Robin Smith is currently the CEO of Blue Ice Docs Inc. – a distribution and equity funding company dedicated to funding, acquiring and distributing the best non-fiction work from around the world and is also the Head of Factual Content for levelFILM – a multi-facet distribution company based in Toronto, Canada.
Robin brings a strong background of over 25 years of film, video and arts-related work to the marketplace having worked at a variety of distribution companies including The National Film Board of Canada, Alliance Films, Lions Gate Film Entertainment, Seville Pictures and Capri Releasing and has managed and navigated the release of such hits as CROUCHING TIGER, HIDDEN DRAGON, ALL ABOUT MY MOTHER, AWAY FROM HER, CAVE OF FORGOTTEN DREAMS, BLACKFISH and KEDI.
Robin has also acted as Executive Producer on a variety of award-winning documentaries including the Oscar-nominated ABACUS: SMALL ENOUGH TO JAIL (dir: Steve James), the Emmy-Award winning SOLITARY (dir: Kristi Jacobson), the Emmy-Award winning ADVOCATE (dir: Rachel Leah Jones, Philippe Bellaiche) and the soon-to-be-released feature A GLITCH IN THE MATRIX (dir: Rodney Asher).
NextGen Award
for best short film
The NextGen Award is a prize given to the best short film at the festival. The winning film is selected by a jury of film students at York University.
Sponsored by The Leonard Wolinsky Foundation
NextGen Award
for best short film Winner:
Director: Sean Wainsteim
JURY STATEMENT: “To speak of the tragedies of human history with a pain cloaked in satire and humour is an almost impossible artistic act. And yet, "Demon Box" dares, and magnificently succeeds, in telling the story of intergenerational trauma in such a way that the viewer cries with one eye and laughs with the other. The film invites us to reflect on our own destinies and teaches us to reconsider them through the prism of love and generosity of the heart. A true cinematic tour de force ! “
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