THE DYBBUK – RESTORED & LIVE SCORED

Join us for this special event screening of one of the most important and influential Jewish films of all time. Filmed just before the outbreak of WWII, The Dybbuk (Der Dibuk, 1937) weaves a mystical story of the Hasidic shtetl communities of the late 19th century with the story of two close friends, Sender and Nisn, who vow to marry their first-born children. But when Sender reneges on the vow to marry his daughter to a wealthier son-in-law, the spirit of Nisn’s son arrives to haunt Leah’s wedding from beyond the grave. A rich, ethnographic tapestry of Jewish legend and mystical themes, The Dybbuk, based on S. Ansky’s seminal play, is one of the finest films ever produced in the Yiddish language. It is presented here in a new digital restoration with English subtitles, and with an original, live score by Yenne Velt.

6:30pm: Introduction with Nathaniel Deutsch

7:00pm: Film starts

Director: Michał Waszyński | Poland | 1937 | 99 min | Yiddish w/ new English subtitles

Yenne Velt (Yiddish for “Other World”)  is an ambient music group whose melodies are rooted in Jewish folk music. The group is comprised of key players in the San Francisco music scene: Forest Reid (Celadon, Country Risqué, Sadie Alan) on pedal steel guitar, Edan Mor (Pupik Bolfth, Mothears, Trinkle Tinkle) on saxophone, Daniel Bromfield (Bromf, Country Risqué, PVJR) on pump organ, Christian Reynolds (the Fell Swoop, Love & Havoc) on bass, and Conner McNesby (Marika Christine, Pilar, Celadon) on drums. With their combined experience as studio and touring musicians, Yenne Velt infuses old melodies with modern improvisational sensibilities.

Nathaniel Deutsch combines historical, textual, and ethnographic methods to explore phenomena from antiquity to the modern period. He is a professor of history and holds the Baumgarten Endowed Chair in Jewish Studies at the University of California Santa Cruz, where he served as the Faculty Director of The Humanities Institute for more than a decade and the Chair of the University of California Consortium of Humanities Centers. Deutsch is currently creating “The Digital Minhag Project: A Crowd-Sourced Archive of Jewish Customs.”

“One of the most solemn attestations to the mystic powers of the spirit the imagination has ever purveyed to the film reel.” –Parker Tyler, Classics of the Foreign Film

“The Dybbuk is haunting and atmospheric, a chilling supernatural romance that functions as a privileged glimpse into the past, to a time when rabbis regularly performed prodigious miracles, when spirits of the dead wandered the Earth, and when tampering with the supernatural inevitably led to the most dire results.” –Kenneth Turan (LA Times and National Public Radio film critic), Not Coming To Theater Near You

This event is Co-Presented by LABA Bay Area, KlezCalifornia, and the Jewish Film Institute.

All seating is first come, first served.

Questions? Email support@jccsf.org