Event
Israeli director Avi Nesher will be leading a Master Class on Directing.
Avi Nesher's award-winning films have played a major part in Israeli cinema to rise him as one of Israel's all-time greatest filmmakers.
In 2008, Nesher received the Outstanding Achievement Award at the Jerusalem Film Festival. In 2009, he received the Cinematic Excellence Award at the Haifa Film Festival and a star on the Avenue of the Stars, an honor rarely bestowed on directors. In 2010 Nesher received the prestigious Landau Award for Excellence in the Arts. That year, Nesher's The Matchmaker, won the Silver Plaque at the Chicago International Film Festival. The Matchmaker was nominated for nine Israeli Academy Awards and won three, including Best Actor and Best Actress. In 2007, Nesher's The Secrets premiered as an official selection at the Toronto Film Festival and was nominated for seven Israeli Academy Awards, and won two. In 2005, Nesher directed the highly experimental political documentary Oriental, which won the Spirit of Freedom Award at the Jerusalem Film Festival. In 2004, Nesher wrote and directed Turn Left at the End of the World, -- a surreal deconstruction of Israel's immigration mythology. Turn Left became Israel's biggest box office success, as well as becoming one of the best reviewed films of the era. It was nominated for eight Israeli Academy Awards and won three.
Nesher wrote and directed Rage and Glory, which we will be screening today at 5:30pm in 401 Fisher-Benett Hall. It tells the controversial story of a Jewish terror organization during the 1940s. Rage and Glory caused a political storm, was lauded by international critics, and in 2001 was selected by the Lincoln Center Film Society as one of the most important films in 50 years of Israeli cinema.
After seeing Rage and Glory, producer Dino De Laurentis convinced Nesher to come to Hollywood. Consequently Nesher wrote and directed the sci-fi mystery Timebomb for MGM and the sensual, supernatural mystery Doppelganger for 20th Century Fox, starring Drew Barrymore, both of which won prizes at the Avoriaz Science Fiction and Fantasy Festival.