Tribeca Begins

With its refreshing mix of younger directors, narrative and documentary and a serious mandate to go global, the Tribeca Film Festival has rapidly become one of my favorite events of the New York film year. (The fact that they make life incredibly easy for journalists doesn't hurt, of course.) The goofiness of deadlines for print publications means that both my Jewish Week pieces on the festival are already up on the JWeek website (here and here), even though the festival doesn't really open until tomorrow morning. I also have a review up of a new Holocaust documentary aimed at middle-school kids or thereabouts; going back to my days of teaching in my synagogue's Hebrew School, I could have used such a film then. Hopefully the next two weeks will be filled with postings about Tribeca. There certainly is no shortage of interesting stuff going on there. (Check out their website for more info.)