First division - The Art of Cinema
What Is Cinema? A fascinating walk through the process of filmmaking
How to make films: a workshop allowing its participants to create short films, thus letting them experience first hand what it is like to create films.
Comedy: the historical background and the principles of comedy will be examined through the analysis of films of the genre, comic situations, and comic characters.
The Musical: music and dance as tools of expression. What characterizes this genre? What can one expect to find in such a film? And what surprises will we find there?
The thriller: the basic structure of the thriller - the individual against intrigues, conspiracies and secrets that stand in the way to resolution and order. We will examine the stylistic and thematic lines of the thriller through the films of Alfred Hitchcock.
Science Fiction - the Future Is Already Here: travel through time, space, and characters from far away galaxies. In this program we will attempt to understand society through technological, social, and political aspects and context and the unification of imagination and anxiety of the unknown.
Comics and Cinema: the adaptation of comic books to film, examining the origin of the comic book and how its language is transferred into cinematic language.
The films of Steven Spielberg
Documenting Reality: the uniqueness of documentary films. The choice to use material depicting real life to tell a story, to express an idea, to present a situation.
8mm: the sincerity and simplicity of amateur films and documentary filmmaking preserving the other quest for a frame - the truth.
Second division - social issues through film
Sweet 16: the way in which cinema treats teen angst and rebellion in its different forms.
Puppy love: Romeo and Juliet. Lovers in films. That first love, innocent, free of prejudice, clashing with social and financial status, and the romantic love that faces difficulties while representing the fight against social and human misgivings.
Violence in film - violent film: different aspects of violence in film: what is stylized violence? What is poetic violence? Mental violence? How does the cinematic language treat such a loaded issue?
Family dinner time: the ritual gathering of the family around the dinner table is a fascinating way to examine the subject of family in film.
Where do we go? The journey from and to home symbolizes identity and belonging, towards an unknown future, as a constant search for meaning and improvement.
Feminism and cinema: the depiction of women on the big screen, and the connection between female representation in film and their social standing.
Equality between the sexes: female and male points of view, the stereotypes embedded in our society, and the political struggles that attempts to change the situation.
Immigration: the program focuses on films that discuss immigration through the conflicts between the older (the immigrants) and younger generations.
The soldier in cinema: the experiences gained from the move from citizen to soldier and the dilemmas this move entails.
Communication and cinema: the representation of communication in film. The relationship between film and television.
Third division - cinematic enrichment of the curriculum
Film and History: the program builds an additional narrative to the understanding of key eras in history.
Borders in cinema: the program deals with the definition of borders and it real and symbolic means.
Ideology and propaganda: a look at how cinema can be manipulated as an artistic medium and communicative tool for the masses.
Representing the Holocaust in cinema: the program will raise issues of the complexity, and at times the danger, of cinema dealing with the Holocaust.
Representing the Holocaust in Israeli film: the lecture, using films, will focus on how the Israeli society's attitude towards the Holocaust and the survivors has changed.
Literature and cinema: basic concepts in the understanding of literature adaptation into film.
Shakespeare in cinema
The bible and cinema: how does cinema help the audience to understand the bible stories.
Theatre and cinema: how did the two languages - film and theatre - influence each other.
Fourth division: Israeli Cinema
The observant Jew in cinema: the changes Israeli cinema has gone through in the depiction of the religious character in film.
Jewish identity: by using films, the program will follow the changes Israeli society has been through in regards to the relation between being Jewish and being Israeli.
Israelis and Arabs - conflict, identity, creativity, and coexistence: examination of the polarization between Arabs and Israelis.
Our small country: a journey through the history of Israeli cinema.
The Arab in Israeli film: the lecture will focus on the construction of the character of the Arab in Israeli cinema.
Fifth division - Judaism and Cinema
Tikun Olam in film and religion: is a person committed to fixing the world? Can one person even do that?
Jewish black magic and cinema
Can we really change? How does change come forth in film? and can we really change?
Holocaust and faith: how did one keep faith during the Holocaust? Is there a place for humor in Holocaust films? What is the connection between humor and faith?
Cinematic Midrash: the lecture will show the close relationship between cinema and Midrash literature.
The Jew in world cinema: how is the Jew depicted in the films produced in Hollywood?
60 years for the establishment of the State of Israel: the Israeli family - identity and distinction; adolescence in Israeli film; the imagery of the army and the soldier; immigration; marginal groups in Israel; meeting Israeli filmmakers.
Social cinema: social struggles; the environment; prejudice and tolerance