Nathan Abrams
By Nathan Abrams
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Culture On British TV, A Renaissance For Jewish Characters
For years, British television has been blighted by stock-in-trade Jewish stereotypes. Audiences have had to endure legions of Jewish mothers, Hasidim and Jews who sound like they got off the boat in 1910 whether they’re 10 or 110, and whether it’s 1910 or 2010! Part of the reason for this is that Jewish creatives have…
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Film & TV The Secret Jewish History of Nuclear War Movies
As Donald Trump and Kim Jong-un engage in nuclear brinkmanship, very real fears of a nuclear Armageddon have emerged. Given that Armageddon has a Hebrew origin (via the Greek translation of Har Meggido), it is not surprising that Jews have had a considerable interest in nuclear apocalypse. Consider the title of MAD magazine, echoing 1950s…
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Film & TV Was ‘Full Metal Jacket’ Stanley Kubrick’s Stealth Holocaust Movie?
As we mark the 30th anniversary of Stanley Kubrick’s Vietnam War movie “Full Metal Jacket,” which was released June 17, 1987, it’s hard to think of a less Jewish topic than the training of a bunch of misfit Marines for a subsequent tour of duty in Vietnam. Indeed, in his famous taxonomy of what was…
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Film & TV Why The Transformers Movies Are Really Stories Of Jewish Resilience and Adaptability
With the release of the fifth installment of the “Transformers” franchise upon us, it seems like an appropriate time to reveal that they are Jewish. The Transformers are giant robots who can change themselves into everyday objects, including cars, airplanes, trucks and tanks. They excel at mimicry, morphing between machine and robot with chameleon-like ease,…
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The Schmooze Debating the Best Israeli Films
With “Footnote” the fourth Israeli film in five years to make it to the shortlist nomination for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film Israel’s recent cinematic prowess is indisputable. Though none of Israel’s total of ten nominations actually won an Oscar there have been many more excellent films to come out of that…
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The Schmooze The World’s Top 10 Jewish Films
After he reviewed Lawrence Baron’s “The Modern Jewish Experience in World Cinema,” we asked contemporary Jewish film scholar Nathan Abrams for his choice of the best recent Jewish films. Below are his choices (in no particular order) of films over the last few decades that have made a significant impact in challenging stereotypes worldwide. “La…
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Culture Toward a Global Jewish Cinema
The Modern Jewish Experience in World Cinema Edited by Lawrence Baron Brandeis University Press, 464 pages, $39.95 Following two speculative top-100 lists of Jewish movie moments and Jewish movies by Heeb and Tablet, respectively, the arrival of the more serious “The Modern Jewish Experience in World Cinema” is timely. Lawrence Baron, Nasatir Chair of Modern…
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The Schmooze The Disembodied Evil of Jewish Horror Movies
Shock Value: How a Few Eccentric Outsiders Gave Us Nightmares, Conquered Hollywood, and Invented Modern Horror By Jason Zinoman The Penguin Press, 272 pages, $25.95 The contribution of Jews to the American film industry both behind and in front of the camera is well known and well documented. Yet, having just read Jason Zinoman’s “Shock…
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