Burman's Ode to El Once Neighborhood

Abstract

In the mid-1990s, young directors such as Daniel Burman began making films about ethnic identities and multiple subjectivities in Argentina. Because these filmmakers relied more on personal stories than on overtly political or historical issues, they paved the way for various ethnic communities to be the focus of Argentine films. Although there is a history of Jewish-themed films in Argentine cinema, there have been few Jewish directors who told these tales from a personal, semi-autobiographical standpoint. In previous decades, the few films that represented narratives of Argentine Jews included Juan Jose Jusids The Jewish Gauchos (1974); Beda Docampo Feijoos World War II drama, Beneath the World (1987); Raul de la Torres Poor Butterfly (1986); and Eduardo Mignognas Autumn Sun (1996). The directors themselves, with the exception of Feijoo, were not of Jewish origin, but they made thoughtful films with wide-ranging and nuanced depictions of Jews in Argentina.