The campaign to free Soviet Jewry is a major event in Jewish history. By 1992, one and a half million Jews had left the Soviet Union to live in freedom as a direct result of what was likely the most successful human rights campaign of all times.
“Refusenik” is the first retrospective documentary to chronicle the thirty-year movement to free Soviet Jews. It shows how a small grassroots effort bold enough to take on a Cold War superpower blossomed into an international human rights campaign that engaged the disempowered and world leaders alike. Told through the eyes of activists on both sides of the Iron Curtain - many of whom survived punishment in Soviet Gulag labor camps.
This documentary is an example of well-crafted storymaking at its finest. Original interviews with key leaders of the movement are fascinating, as are the archival photographs and film footage — some of it made and smuggled out of the Soviet Union by activists who had traveled to Russia on tourist visas.
What: Screening of “Refusenik” followed by discussion led by Boris Vladimirsky
When: Thursday, April 23rd at 7:30pm
Where: JCC Palo Alto, Cubberley Community Center, 4000 Middlefield Road, Room H1, Palo Alto, CA, 94303
Who: Russian speaking young adults
Cost: $5
