Four Winters: A Story of Jewish Partisan Resistance and Bravery in WWII (2022)
Director: Julia Mintz Run Time: 90 min. Rating: NR Release Year: 2022
Country: United States
Language: English
About the film:
Best Documentary, 2022 Toronto Jewish Film Festival
Human Rights Awards, 2022 Hamptons Doc Fest
“An enduring warning amid today’s global struggle with authoritarian forces.”
—Nicholas Rapold for The New York Times
“All I owned was my camera, a leopard coat, and a grenade in case of capture…the pillow was the rifle, the walls were the trees and the sky was the roof,” says partisan Faye Schulman. Over 25,000 Jewish partisans, fought back against the Nazis and their collaborators from deep within the forests of WWII’s Eastern Europe, Ukraine and Belarus. Against extraordinary odds, they escaped Nazi slaughter, transforming from young innocents raised in closely knit families to courageous resistance fighters.
Shattering the myth of Jewish passivity, the last surviving partisans tell their stories of resistance in Four Winters: A Story of Jewish Partisan Resistance and Bravery in WWII (2022), revealing a stunning narrative of heroism and resilience.
“I set out to make this film in search of an answer to my long-lasting childhood question: “Why didn’t the Jews fight back?” What I discovered, through the survivors’ searing memories, were riveting stories of courageous and inspiring resistance – a chapter in our collective history about the Jewish Partisans that needed to be told.”
—Julia Mintz, Director, Writer & Producer
About the filmmaker:
Julia Mintz is a writer, producer and director whose work focuses on narratives of bravery and resistance against unimaginable odds. She has been on the producing team for films that have been shortlisted for the Academy Awards, have premiered at Cannes, Sundance and Tribeca, and won Emmy, Peabody and festival awards. Her films can be seen on HBO, PBS, American Masters, NETFLIX and Amazon.
Her feature directorial debut Four Winters: A Story of Jewish Partisan Resistance and Bravery in WWII (2022) was awarded a grant from Steven Spielberg’s Jewish Story Partners fund and received the Human Rights Award at the 2022 Hamptons Doc Fest, Best Documentary at the Toronto Jewish Film Festival, and the Audience Award at Australia’s International Jewish Film Festival.
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