Mark Podwal is the writer and co-producer of a film which is premiering in the US at the Hampton Film Festival. The 52 minute documentary House of Life: The Old Jewish Cemetery in Prague is a collaboration of Academy Award winning filmmaker Allan Miller (From Mao to Mozart) and artist Mark Podwal whose works on Prague have been reproduced by the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The celebrated actress Claire Bloom is the film’s narrator.
Miller who has won two academy awards, has directed and produced over 35 documentary films, many shown on PBS. The screening is on Thursday Oct 18 at 12:30 PM at the UA Cinema in East Hampton.
Prague’s Old Jewish Cemetery, a place of haunting beauty and mystery, has endured wars and pogroms, floods and fires, assimilation and an urban clearing project that destroyed most of the ancient Jewish Quarter it once served. Miraculously, it even survived the Nazi occupation and forty years of Communist neglect. House of Life tells the story of the vibrant Prague Jewish community of the past and of today’s small Jewish community for whom the cemetery still serves as a spiritual center. In the film we encounter the curators, historians, rabbis, guides, conservationists, all devoted to the preservation of this unforgettable place.
