Gila Almagor

Following are capsule reviews of a selection of the screenings today and Sunday at the American Film Institute Los Angeles International Film Festival at the Cineplex Odeon Cenutry Plaza Cinemas. SUNDAY 'The Summer of Aviya' Israel, 1988, 94 minutes 8:30 p.m. Gila Almagor, grande dame among Israeli actresses, fashions one of her finest roles in this charming, funny and deeply poignant memoir of a bright 10-year-old girl, Aviya (Kaipo Cohen, an enchantress), whose warm, loving and fiercely independent mother (Almagor)

The sixth annual Israeli Film Festival, at the Cineplex Odeon Fairfax Theater, opens Saturday with a gem. "Summer of Aviya" (8:30 p.m.) is based on an autobiographical novel by one of Israel's leading actresses, Gila Almagor, who also produced the film and plays the spectacular leading role: a single mother deeply scarred by her Holocaust experiences, a complex character based on Almagor's own mother. "Aviya," Silver Bear winner at the 1989 Berlin Film Festival, is unflinchingly honest.

Most of her life, Gila Almagor, Israel's leading actress, had lived with a dark secret--a secret now brought to light in the largely autobiographical film "The Summer of Aviya." The film, which centers on a child's traumatic loss of her war-scarred mother to madness, has won the Silver Menorah, Israel's highest film award. Almagor and the film's director, Eli Cohen, also received the award.

Following are capsule reviews of a selection of the screenings today and Sunday at the American Film Institute Los Angeles International Film Festival at the Cineplex Odeon Cenutry Plaza Cinemas. SUNDAY 'The Summer of Aviya' Israel, 1988, 94 minutes 8:30 p.m. Gila Almagor, grande dame among Israeli actresses, fashions one of her finest roles in this charming, funny and deeply poignant memoir of a bright 10-year-old girl, Aviya (Kaipo Cohen, an enchantress), whose warm, loving and fiercely independent mother (Almagor)

The sixth annual Israeli Film Festival, at the Cineplex Odeon Fairfax Theater, opens Saturday with a gem. "Summer of Aviya" (8:30 p.m.) is based on an autobiographical novel by one of Israel's leading actresses, Gila Almagor, who also produced the film and plays the spectacular leading role: a single mother deeply scarred by her Holocaust experiences, a complex character based on Almagor's own mother. "Aviya," Silver Bear winner at the 1989 Berlin Film Festival, is unflinchingly honest.

Gila Almagor, grande dame of the Israeli cinema, fashioned one of her finest roles in "The Summer of Aviya," a charming, funny and deeply poignant memoir of a bright 10-year-old girl whose warm, loving and fiercely independent mother (Almagor) is periodically wracked with mental breakdowns. It was directed tenderly by Eli Cohen.

The 15th anniversary Jewish Film Festival, boasting eight world or North American premieres and offering 42 films this year, opens today in San Francisco and continues there through July 27. The festival also runs in Berkeley from July 29-Aug. 3. While similar, smaller festivals are held in other cities around the country, this is the largest of its kind. The works come from 14 countries, and they are all by and about Jews.

The 22nd annual Israel Film Festival officially opens Wednesday at Grauman's Chinese Theatre in Hollywood with Shemi Zarhin's "Aviva, My Love," a drama about a hard-working mother who has a secret writing talent. But on Tuesday, the organizers will kick things off with a gala at the Beverly Hilton Hotel that honors "Borat" star Sacha Baron Cohen, Sony Pictures Entertainment co-chair Amy Pascal and Israeli actress Gila Almagor.

Both geographically and dramatically, "The Human Resources Manager" covers a lot of territory. The latest work from director Israeli director Eran Riklis, it travels from Jerusalem to the capital of an unnamed Eastern Europe country (filming was done in Romania) and then to the far hinterlands of that beleaguered nation. In terms of narrative, "Human Resources Manager" adroitly mixes moving personal drama, absurdist comedy and site-specific cultural situations. More than anything, this is an intelligent audience picture, a solid and engrossing piece of old-school filmmaking, both humane and character driven, in which the various protagonists learn something ?

The Simon Wiesenthal Center's Moriah Films continues its distinguished series of documentaries with "In Search of Peace Part One: 1948-1967," which chronicles the first half of Israel's existence. Written by Sir Martin Gilbert and the center's Rabbi Marvin Hier, and adapted by its director, Richard Trank, "In Search of Peace" unfolds in straightforward fashion, bringing clarity and a personal touch to a complex and turbulent era of history.

Most of her life, Gila Almagor, Israel's leading actress, had lived with a dark secret--a secret now brought to light in the largely autobiographical film "The Summer of Aviya." The film, which centers on a child's traumatic loss of her war-scarred mother to madness, has won the Silver Menorah, Israel's highest film award. Almagor and the film's director, Eli Cohen, also received the award.

Fons Rademakers' "The Rose Garden" (at the Westside Pavilion) certainly accomplishes what it sets out to do: Call attention to an especially hideous Nazi atrocity and show how difficult it is to bring the responsible Nazi commandant to justice. Rademakers, the veteran Dutch director whose similarly themed "The Assault" won an Oscar, suggests quite forcefully how a segment of the German population continues to resist coming to terms with the Holocaust.

The Laemmle Theaters' Cinema Judaica '95 continues to offer outstanding pictures, old and new, at the Monica 4-Plex. Mathieu Kassovitz's "Cafe au Lait" (today at 12:30 and 9:30 p.m.) is an amusing, up-to-the-minute romantic comedy involving a Woody Allenish young messenger (Kassovitz); his beautiful girlfriend, daughter of a white father and a black mother; and her other boyfriend, the rich, athletic son of an ambassador from an African nation.