Every week on Cinebuds sponsored by Joe Wilde Garage Doors, Kristopher Pollard from Milwaukee Film and Radio Milwaukee’s Dori Zori review movies, tell you which ones are showing in our city and talk with the people who help bring them to the big screen.
The collection of film festivals that light up big screens around the area every year are more than opportunities to watch movies. They’re also a chance to share an experience you wouldn’t have otherwise, often with people from varied backgrounds and perspectives.
Back for its 29th installment, the Milwaukee Jewish Film Festival emphasizes that togetherness by picking five exclusively non-streaming selections that tell universal stories of inspiration, hilarity, entertainment, history and more. The main slate takes place at Marcus North Shore Cinema on Oct. 11, 12, 14, 15 and 19, with this year’s event featuring a bonus selection that organizers from the Harry & Rose Samson Family Jewish Community Center decided was “simply too important not to share.”
Two of those organizers, Chief Communications Officer Julie Lookatch and Director of Special Events Micki Seinfeld, join us to share their thoughts on the festival’s lineup, what makes the festival’s post-screening talkbacks so special, and why these cinematic stories welcome community members of all faiths and backgrounds.
Milwaukee Jewish Film Festival: 2026 schedule
All films begin at 7 p.m.
Dust Bowls & Jewish Souls: Another Side of Woody Guthrie
Sunday, Oct. 11
Marcus North Shore Cinema
The unlikely intersection of American folk music and Jewish culture comes to life through Woody Guthrie’s years in Coney Island. After marrying Jewish dancer Marjorie Mazia in 1940, Guthrie immersed himself in the vibrant traditions of her family, especially the influence of his mother-in-law, acclaimed Yiddish poet Aliza Greenblatt.
This cultural exchange sparked a remarkable body of Jewish themed work: Hanukkah songs, borschtbelt humor and powerful reflections on the Holocaust. Guthrie also drew bold parallels between Jewish refugees escaping persecution and the Dust Bowl migrants he championed, revealing a shared story of displacement, resilience, and hope. Decades later, the Klezmatics revived and celebrated this legacy in their Grammy-winning recordings.
Once Upon My Mother
Monday, Oct. 12
Marcus North Shore Cinema
Set in France beginning in 1963, this uplifting family drama follows Esther Perez, a Moroccan-Jewish immigrant and devoted mother of six who refuses to accept doctors’ predictions that her newborn son Roland, born with a clubfoot, will never live a full life.
Driven by unwavering faith, determination and unconditional love, Esther dedicates herself to helping Roland overcome every obstacle in his path. Balancing humor with heartfelt emotion, the story chronicles a remarkable mother-son bond and celebrates the sacrifices parents make to help their children achieve their dreams.
Lucky Star
Wednesday, Oct. 14
Marcus North Shore Cinema
Set in France in 1940, Lucky Star centers on Jean Chevalin, a bumbling deserter who never meant to go AWOL. He just panicked, bolted the wrong way and somehow stumbled home with no uniform, no honor and no plan. With his guilty conscience gnawing at him and the Nazis closing in, Jean hatches a desperate, harebrained scheme: disguise his wife and son as Jews to slip into the smuggler networks ferrying refugees to the Free Zone.
What starts as a shameless ruse quickly careens into a whirlwind of chaos, catapulting Jean and his bewildered family into the Resistance, danger and the kind of perilous escapades where survival requires more than sleight of hand. For a man who’s spent his life hiding behind lies and cowardly tricks, Jean now faces the grimly hilarious irony that the only way out is to find real courage.
We Met at Grossinger's
Thursday, Oct. 15
Marcus North Shore Cinema
At a time when prejudice and exclusion limited opportunities for Jewish immigrants to fully participate in American society, the Borscht Belt offered a rare sanctuary of belonging. At its center stood Grossinger’s Resort and Hotel, the crown jewel of the Catskills where Jewish families and other marginalized communities found both respite and community beyond the pressures of New York City.
As its reputation grew, Grossinger’s became a gathering place for some of the most influential figures in American culture and public life, including Mel Brooks, Jerry Seinfeld, Jackie Robinson and Eleanor Roosevelt. Through rich archival material and intimate storytelling, award-winning filmmaker Paula Eiselt resurrects this vanished world with warmth and vitality.
The Wedding Entertainer (or the Tale of Moishe Badhan)
Monday, Oct. 19
Marcus North Shore Cinema
The Wedding Entertainer is a heartfelt comedy about Moishe, a former star of Jerusalem’s Hasidic wedding scene who’s struggling to rebuild his life and earn enough money for his daughter’s wedding. When a wealthy childhood friend returns from America, Moishe sees a potential solution to his troubles: a second chance as the sidekick of the famous American Badchan Meshulam. At the wedding, everything spins out of control.
Among Neighbors (Director’s Interview Version)
Monday, Nov. 9
Jewish Community Center
Combining magical realism and evocative hand-drawn animation with revelatory interviews and verité footage, Among Neighbors examines the story of a small rural town where Jews and Polish Catholics lived side by side for centuries before World War II. The film brings the Polish response to the Holocaust to life, revealing both love and betrayal as it zeroes in on one of the last living Holocaust survivors from the town and an aging eyewitness who saw Jews murdered there — not by Nazis, but by her own Polish neighbors.
