Festival Blog 2026: Tuesday

Today, Tuesday, May 5, 2026, marks the opening of the 32nd Jewish Film Festival Berlin Brandenburg (JFBB). Over five days, the festival presents 60 films from 22 countries, welcomes international guests, and invites audiences to numerous Q&As and discussions. The program offers a multifaceted panorama of Jewish history and contemporary life, featuring two competitions—fiction and documentary—as well as a range of special sections.

Opening Ceremony at the Hans Otto Theater
The festival opens this evening at the Hans Otto Theater in Potsdam with invited guests, filmmakers, and friends of the JFBB. This year’s opening presents a short film program featuringTHE HOLINESS (IL 2025, 17'), BESHERT (UK 2025, 19'), NO WITCHES IN THE VALLEY (IL 2025, 13', animation), and SNIPPED (DK 2025, 14').

Free admission for pupils and students on opening day
Students and school pupils receive free admission to all events today! As part of Student Day, supported by the Foundation for Tolerance and International Understanding, we invite young audiences to explore the JFBB program. Simply come by with a valid student or pupil ID.

Program Highlights on May 5
At Thalia Programmkino in Potsdam, we are screening the documentary NELLY & NADINE by Magnus Gertten at 5:00 PM as part of the Nordic Jewish Focus section. The film tells the true love story between Belgian opera singer Nelly Mousset-Vos and French-Chinese diplomat’s daughter Nadine Hwang, who met in the Ravensbrück concentration camp in 1944. The documentary brings to light a queer story of survival that long remained absent from collective memory.

THE YEAR MY PARENTS WENT ON VACATIONby Cao Hamburger will be shown twice today. Twelve-year-old Mauro is a football fan eagerly following the 1970 World Cup in Mexico. When his parents suddenly go “on vacation” and leave him with his grandfather in São Paulo—whom he barely knows—he must find his way in a new reality… Screenings take place at 4:30 PM at Filmkunst 66 in Berlin and at 7:00 PM at Thalia Programmkino in Potsdam.

At Filmkunst 66, we will also welcome our first guest at 5:00 PM: following the screening of his film KNOW HOPE(IL/US 2025), director Omer Shamir will be present for a Q&A. The film is part of the Documentary Competition. In KNOW HOPE, Shamir engages in a layered cinematic dialogue with the street artist Know Hope, whose work has evolved over the years within the tensions of increasingly strained life in Israel and Palestine.

The full program can be found here.

Tickets for all screenings are €10 (€8 reduced) and are available at jfbb.info or directly at the venues.

We wish you a wonderful opening day and look forward to an intense and inspiring festival week!