Avivit Geva is the director of Jewish arts and culture with the William and Irene Weinberg Family Baltimore Jewish Film Festival, which has been a part of the Charm City community for 38 years. Geva has worked with JCCs and their film festivals in Canada and Florida, but she said that there is something special about Baltimore.
“It’s a range of ages that come. You’ll see young adults, but you also see the elderly and older adults. I think that’s very special. I find that the community is very connected to the JCC — with a lot of events that we do, I see the same people at multiple events and programs. It’s really nice to be a part of that special community,” Geva said.
The festival takes place over the course of four months, with one film being shown each month from April to July. Prior to this year, the festival showed films on a weekly basis instead of a monthly one, but received feedback that convinced it to change the schedule for 2026. The four featured films this year are “The Ring,” a 2024 dramedy; “Soda,” a drama from 2024; “31 Candles,” a 2025 drama; and “The Blonde Boy From the Casbah,” a semi-autographical drama from 2023.
Each year, the organizers try to show the breadth of Jewish film making.
“People enjoy the variety. They enjoy seeing new films, and mainstream [ones]. I think it’s the variety that we’re trying to bring. The new additions are important,” Geva said.
Each year, as many as 200 people attend each of the featured nighttime showings. This year’s festival is at the Gordon Center in Owings Mills. Geva said that another thing that makes the Baltimore Jewish Film Festival special is the fact that the team that puts it on is entirely in-house. All who are involved with the planning and production are Baltimore-based Jews.
“That’s something very special,” Geva said.
The first film, “The Ring,” is being shown on Yom HaShoah. It’s a movie by beloved Israeli comedian Adir Miller that features a family’s quest related to an heirloom, a gold ring, that helped their ancestors survive the Holocaust.
While the festival looks to explore different ideas and feature fresh voices each year, Geva said that it is particularly important for them to include stories about the Holocaust.
“We like to have variety, but we will always have one that connects to the Holocaust — either a story from the past or [related] to something that happened. We cannot forget the Holocaust,” Geva said.
Geva said that the team starts with 30 to 40 options for films, and presents those to a committee, who watches them and provides feedback. The committee selects 10 final choices, and from those 10, Geva and the rest of the film festival staff select the ones that will actually be shown. They are especially proud of this year’s lineup.
“We have ‘Soda,’ which means ‘her secret,’ in Hebrew. It’s also something that connects to the Holocaust, but it’s about the life she is going through now and how the community sees her. It’s a beautiful film. After that, we have ‘31 Candles,’ which is very Jewish and very funny. And ‘The Blonde Boy from the Casbah,’ which is an English and French film,” Geva said.
While the event has been going for decades and draws good crowds, Geva said that the film festival team still feels like there is room for improvement.
“We’re trying to outreach more so people will know about this film festival. Sometimes, we don’t feel that we are reaching enough people, because I think it [the festival] has the opportunity to actually get an even larger capacity,” Geva said.
The event is held each year by the William and Irene Weinberg Baltimore Jewish Film Institute and is a cherished part of Jewish life in Baltimore. For Geva, the long-standing event is something that needs to continue.
“Jewish films are important because they show our heritage, our history, our culture,” she said.
