VIFF 2005 Reviews

“The Protocols of the Elders of Zion” is a document that has been circulating the globe in various forms as "evidence" of an international Jewish conspiracy concocted by a group of rabbis elders in the last century. It declares the supposed intention of international jewry to take over the world, essentially by any means necessary. While absurdist to most, this brash piece of paranoia was taken as gospel by eminent Americans and is still read and sold around the world as proof positive of an international Jewish conspiracy. According to your local anti-semite, the book can even explain Jewish involvement in the tragedy of 9/11 and why “no Jews were killed on that day”.

Filmmaker Marc Levin has done some hard thinking about this piece of literary anti-semitic propaganda and in his new documentary The Protocols of Zion takes a personal journey as an American Jew into the mindset of Muslim-Americans, Jewish Americans, Christian evangelicals, neo-Nazis, Holocaust survivors and prison inmates. Arab-American and Middle-Eastern Arabic media are also used to explore existing attitudes towards Jews and how so much of contemporary anti-semitism stems from the insanity of that absurd yet frightening piece of written bigotry, most likely created in Czarist Russia as a means of justifying the persecution of East European Jews to the Russian people. Not an academic polemic, Levin’s film presents a series of tough, street-wise discussions - including conversations with disaffected Palestinian-Americans. At the same time, it's a personal journey - the director's father joins him in his search for truth.

From shocking statements of instilled ignorance from children - “All Jews are apes and dogs,” a three year old Egyptian girl comments, “It says so in the Koran,” - to politically sanctioned anti-semitism - “The Jews rule the world by proxy,” said the Indonesian Prime Minister at a public conference - Levin’s film never loses its sense of humour (old Jewish ladies in Florida figuring out how to use new computerized voting equipment), its pathos (a shocking videotaped confession of executed journalist Daniel Perl declaring he and his family are Jews) or its feeling as the film is in fact a journey of self-discovery for the filmmaker as he traces his own multi-generational family history in Brooklyn and New Jersey in the context of a growing global bigotry toward this endlessly stigmatized minority group.

Protocols of Zion is a fascinating and disturbing yet ultimately rewarding examination of the great American melting pot, often told through angry voices yet concluding with a quiet humanity. Not to be missed.