OVER BABIY YAR?

BREAD OF SHAME

DEPUTIES-JEWS. WELL, SO?

BITTER MEMORY OF WAR

An outskirt of a small town Shchors in the Chernigov region has become a construction site for a ghetto. They shoot here a 12-part film "Heavy sand" after the novel of the same title by Anatoly Rybakov. The Moscow government has allotted money to the Russian company "Risk" to shoot the film. Many TV-companies are said to have expressed their intention to purchase rights to show a serial. Let's hope Ukrainian companies are among competitors, otherwise we will have to "trace" the film on Russian TV-channels.

Catholic church has sharply criticized the film "Amen" about Holocaust and Vatican by a Jewish director Konstantin Kosta-Gavras. Church representatives have declared the film slanders Pope Piy XII. The film unveils futile attempts by the Jewish community to convince Pope to counteract fascist atrocities.

Yael Strom, a musician, film director, photographer and writer moved to America form the former USSR. He has recently shot a film entitled "Lehaim, comrade Stalin!" - on a life of Jews in Birobijan in 1930s. "I was eager to convey an atmosphere of the time, to describe everyday life of people who then bothered to observe Jewish traditions. Many of them fell prey to Holocaust though this is not reflected in the film. I intended to show people I spent childhood with since many of them have already joined the silent majority. Let memory about them live forever, - says director. He long studied achieves, processed the subjects and only after that took to film-making.