Admission: General – $10 | YIVO, CJH, LBI members, seniors and students – $7
Box Office: smarttix.com | 212.868.4444

In his award-winning film, Free Fall, acclaimed filmmaker Péter Forgács provides an intimate reflection on the time before the Holocaust in Hungary through the story of one Jewish family. Using the home movies of musician, photographer and businessman, György Pető, Free Fall leads us through the story of Pető and his family: their private and personal aspirations, their happiness, and the step-by-step erosion of their illusions of safety. How could they understand segregation, and racist laws if “angels’ voices” recited them? This screening commemorates the 70th anniversary of the beginning of nationwide mass deportations in Hungary.

Péter Forgács will introduce the film and join us for a post-screening discussion.

Péter Forgács is the creator of the new media installation Letters to Afar, a project commissioned by the Museum of the History of Polish Jews in Warsaw and YIVO. To learn more visit here.

This screening of Free Fall is presented by YIVO, the Center for Jewish History and the Leo Baeck Institute.

Péter Forgács (1950) ranks among the best known media artists today. His international career was launched by a series of found footage documentaries, notably when The Bartos Family won the grand prize of the Hague Video Festival in 1990. These documentaries use footage from the Private Photo and Film Archives Foundation, which Forgács launched in 1983 and has been supervising since. Apart from his extensive documentary work which is recognized today as a unique take on post-modernist poetics of history and the difficulties of narrating the past(s), he has been involved in collaborations with contemporary musical groups and has presented a number of highly acclaimed installations, including The Danube Exodus at The Getty Research Institute in 2002 and Col Tempo at the 54th Venice Biennale. His most recent major commission has been the project Letters to Afar, which was commissioned by the Museum of the History of Polish Jews in Warsaw and YIVO.