Movie by Israeli director Tom Nesher to be shown at Tribeca Festival

The Tribeca Festival just announced that it will include Come Closer, a movie by Israeli director Tom Nesher, in its Viewpoints section. Tribeca is held in New York City and it will take place this year from June 5-16.

"In these difficult days, when we see boycotts of Israeli art and huge demonstrations around the world (and in New York in particular), it is a [matter of] great pride for us that the film was chosen to be shown at a prestigious festival like the Tribeca Festival, in the heart of Manhattan,” Nesher said in a statement. 

Come Closer is Nesher’s debut as a feature-film director. The movie tells the story of Eden, a young woman from a privileged but troubled Tel Aviv family whose best friend is her younger brother, Nati. When he is suddenly killed in an accident, she struggles to cope with her grief and discovers that he had a girlfriend he kept secret from her, a girl named Maya from a much more modest background. Eden goes on an obsessive quest to find Maya, and the two young women are drawn together in a bond forged in pain, as their story takes a passionate and dangerous twist.

Tribeca will feature several Jewish films 

The movie stars newcomers Lia Elalouf and Daria Rosen in the lead roles, and the rest of the cast includes Ido Tako, Yaakov Zada-Daniel, and Neta Garty. If Nesher’s name is familiar, it is because her father is director Avi Nesher, who cast Garty in her first film role in his movie, Turn Left at the End of the World, 20 years ago. Musician Shlomi Shaban will make his acting debut in Come Closer.

Nesher, who has made several acclaimed short films, most recently And Now Shut Your Eyes and was a correspondent for Reshet 13, added, “My heart is full of pride for my dear partners in the creation of the film -- the actors and actresses, the crew, and everyone who took part in this long and exciting journey. Our soul is completely invested in this film, which was created out of great pain and with a lot of love for life and their strength. Come Closer is intended for everyone who chooses life, even after loss and endless pain. The excitement over the film's world premiere is enormous, but more than anything else, I'm waiting for the day when the film meets the Israeli audience."

The movie is tentatively scheduled to be released in Israel in the fall. 

The Tribeca Film Festival was established in 2002 by Jane Rosenthal, Craig Hatkoff, and Robert De Niro (whose work will be the subject of a tribute this year), to help revitalize lower Manhattan following the 9/11 terror attack. Israeli films have often won important prizes at the festival and David Volach’s My Father My Lord and Talya Lavie’s Zero Motivation each won the Best Narrative Feature Award. Ohad Knoller won the Best Actor Award for Yossi & Jagger, while Shira Haas and Joy Rieger won Best Actress Awards there for the films, Asia and Virgins, respectively. 

In addition to Come Closer, there will be a number of films of Jewish interest in the festival. These include the documentary Sabbath Queen, the story of Rabbi Amichai Lau-Lavie, a 39th generation Orthodox rabbi, who has become a drag queen, which was directed by Sandi DuBowski.

Treasure, directed by Julia von Heinz, stars Stephen Fry as a Holocaust survivor who reluctantly takes a trip back to Poland with his daughter, played by Lena Dunham. 

Bad Shabbos, directed by Daniel Robbins, looks at two very different Jewish couples and stars Kyra Sedgwick, Cliff “Method Man” Smith, and David Paymer

Between the Temples, directed by Nathan Silver, stars Jason Schwartzman as a troubled cantor and Carol Kane as his former teacher who becomes his bat mitzvah student.