FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact:
Ellen Friedland, Producer
973.744.0570 ellen@jemglo.org
SAFEGUARDING MEMORY
Documentary to Screen at Long Island International Film Expo
Tuesday, July 12, 2011
2:30 pm Film Block (last film in block)
Bellmore Movies, 222 Pettit Avenue, Side Entrance, Bellmore, NY
June 13, 2011 | Montclair, New Jersey: Safeguarding Memory: Commemorating Jewish Mass Graves in Poland is a 30-minute documentary narrated by actor Theodore Bikel in which several Polish now-elderly witnesses to mass murders of Jews during the Holocaust recount the details they beheld as children or teens. Bearing their secrets to a sensitive Polish businessman named Zbigniew Nizinski, the sites are revealed to Poland's Chief Rabbi Michael Schudrich. Schudrich, with the help of New York businessman Harley Lippman - originally from Merrick, Long Island and a member of the US Commission for the Preservation of America's Heritage Abroad -- ensure that the mass grave sites are properly commemorated, instilling a sense of dignity to the victims. As an Official Selection to the Long Island International Film Expo, the documentary will screen on Tuesday, July 12th as the last film in the 2:30 pm film block. The theater is Bellmore Movies, 222 Pettit Avenue in Bellmore. Harley Lippman and the filmmakers will be present for the Q&A; following the block.
While many people are aware of the seven death camps and the multitude of concentration camps and ghettos that the Germans erected in Poland during the Holocaust, few are aware that the country is also lined with scores of sites of executions, massacres and mass burials of Jewish victims. Many of these spots go undetected; the majority have not even been identified to date and lack any monument status. Safeguarding Memory provides evidence of this chapter of Holocaust history in Poland through the eyes of individuals who witnessed it and are eager to share the facts before their memories die with them.
Narrator Theodore Bikel is one of the most talented and versatile artists in
the theater, film, and music worlds today. Fluent in English, Hebrew, Yiddish, German, and French, Bikel is perhaps best known for playing the role of Tevye over 2,000 times since 1967 in Fiddler on the Roof. Bikel also created the
role of Baron von Trapp in the original Broadway production of The Sound Of Music. Other Broadway and London credits include Zorba, Tonight In Samarkand, The Rope Dancers, The Lark and The Love Of Four Colonels.
The documentary received an Honorable Mention at the Los Angeles New Wave International Film Festival. Safeguarding Memory was also an Official Selection at the Iowa City and Kansas City Film Festivals. Since its release in January, it has already been broadcast on over 30% of the PBS market across the US.
The documentary was produced by nonprofit multimedia company JEMGLO in Montclair, NJ. Since its founding in 1996, JEMGLO has produced - in addition to Safeguarding Memory -- seven documentaries that have been broadcast on PBS channels across the US and screened worldwide, garnering numerous awards.
Director/cinematographer Curt Fissel has received Emmy nominations, a Cine Golden Eagle, and many journalism awards over his 30-year career. Producer Ellen Friedland is originally from Jericho, Long Island.
ELECTRONIC PHOTOS AND TRAILER AVAILABLE AT
www.safeguardingmemorymovie.com