The 22d annual Boston Jewish Film Festival begins Wednesday night, and this year finds the venerable event in something of a midlife crisis. There are many fine films to be seen in the festival’s 12 days of screenings — movies about the Holocaust, the diaspora, life in modern Israel — but there doesn’t appear to be a breakout experience on the order of last year’s “Eli and Ben’’ or, reaching further back, 2004’s “Nina’s Tragedies’’ or the same year’s devastating documentary, “Lullaby.’’ This isn’t really the fault of the BJFF: The biggest problem with any festival, especially one organized around cultural, religious, ethnic, or national themes, is that programmers are beholden to what’s out there in any given year. And this festival, in its noble annual desire to embrace all four categories, always runs the risk of sacrificing depth for breadth of appeal. Yet, while there are gems among the movies screening in various locations in and around the city — highlights are below, with “Army of Crime,’’ “My Perestroika,’’ and “Five Hours From Paris’’ particularly worthy of note — this year’s edition feels like a moment to take stock. Previous festivals have pointedly asked “Who is a Jew?’’ This one seems to wonder “Who is a Jewish moviegoer — and what does he or she want?’’
MAYA (opening-night film) An unformed young stage actress comes of age in the latest drama from Israeli actress-turned-director Michal Bat-Adam (“Madame Rosa,’’ HBO’s “In Therapy’’). A lot of personal material and emotions may have gone into this project, as the title character (played by Liron Ben-Chelouche) has to navigate the attentions of her hunky chauvinist director (Gil Frank), tackle the role of a mentally disturbed woman by hanging out with schizophrenic patients, and guide her roommate through a personal crisis. That’s a lot to ask of a newcomer and Ben-Chelouche, regrettably, doesn’t have what it takes: She is sympathetic but out of her depth, and the film’s a tender, unfocused misfire as a result. Wednesday, Coolidge Corner; Nov. 9, Hollywood Hits, Danvers. (Ty Burr)
ANITA Marcos Carnevale directed and co-wrote this drama that begins as a sweet portrait of the relationship between Anita (Alejandra Manzo), a cherubic young woman with Down syndrome, and her loving mother (Norma Aleandro). Not too far in, an act of anti-Semitism leaves Anita in the company of strangers, all of whom are down and/or out. Carnevale works hard to move us, and he’s not unsuccessful — Manzo is an affectingly natural performer. But as Anita brings meaning to other’s lives, you can feel him pulling strings. Her best encounter is with a no-nonsense woman named Nora, who’s played with great frowning snap and burnt-orange hair by Leonor Manso. She might need the cheer. That haircut does not. Thursday, West Newton. (Wesley Morris)
THE TROTSKY Montreal teenager Leon Bronstein (Jay Baruchel) is in the throes of an atypical adolescent crisis: He’s convinced he’s the reincarnation of Bolshevik revolutionary Leon Trotsky. Remanded to public school after a hunger strike at his father’s garment factory, young Leon galvanizes the apathetic students into unionizing, nettles the Lenin-like principal (Colm Feore), and pitches passionate nerd woo to an “older woman’’ law student (Emily Hampshire). Writer-director Jacob Tierney has assembled a fine supporting cast (Michael Murphy, Geneviève Bujold, Saul Rubinek), and it’s nice to see Baruchel (“Knocked Up,’’ “Tropic Thunder’’) get a lead role; the movie delivers smart, antic laughs without once moving out from the shadow of Wes Anderson’s “Rushmore.’’ Nov. 8, Coolidge Corner. (TB)
ARMY OF CRIME Any opportunity to sit down with a film by the underheralded Frenchman Robert Guédiguian is one you should take. His films rarely receive full American distribution. Sadly, that includes this one, which is among his strongest. It’s set during the German Occupation and focuses on the resistance’s “l’affiche rouge’’ phase, in which the Nazis used propaganda to turn resistance fighters into national outlaws. Loyalties splinter among the partisans, one of whom is Missak Manouchian (Simon Abkarian), an Armenian poet, whose pacifist philosophy shifts after he’s captured and the Nazis tighten their vise. The writing is complex and tight, the acting strong, and the pacing often as fast and slashing as any political thriller. Its premiere at Cannes last year was promptly overshadowed by Quentin Tarantino’s “Inglourious Basterds’’ and Marco Bellocchio’s “Vincere’’ and unfavorably compared to Jean-Pierre Melville’s “Army of Shadows,’’ as if any film could clear that bar. Guédiguian’s movie is strong all the same. That both it and its maker continue to be kept from audiences in this country is also a crime. Saturday, Museum of Fine Arts. (WM)
SAVIORS IN THE NIGHT How many movies about surviving the Holocaust can there be? Arguably as many as there were survivors. The focus in Dutch director Ludi Boeken’s solid, well-acted film is on the German peasants of Westphalia who hid Jewish families in their midst (if they were blond enough) and in their barns (if they weren’t). The script is based on the memoirs of survivor Marga Spiegel (played by Veronica Ferres in the film), but the real drama lies in the interplay of the farmers as their most humane impulses are wracked by fear, poverty, and lingering anti-Semitism. Most entries in this genre are about those who were hidden, but “Saviors’’ is equally interested in those who did the hiding, and in the life-altering choices they made each and every day. Nov. 13, Arlington Capitol. (TB)
HIDDEN CHILDREN A shameless kitchen-sink drama about Gérald and Robert Finaly, infants whose Jewish parents left them at a French nunnery at the dawn of the German Occupation. They’re punted to a devout Catholic (Charlotte de Turckheim) who proceeds to have them baptized. The movie, directed by Fabrice Genestal, essentially turns into a loosely sketched custody war between the legal team of the boys’ relatives and their surrogate mother, whom de Turckheim baldly plays as an anti-Semitic battle-ax. It ends with a shrug that seems to miss the real intrigue of the Finaly brothers’ story: What happened when, as young men, they arrived in Israel? Since the family had a hand in the production, one can assume that just didn’t interest them. Nov. 7, MFA. (WM)
MY PERESTROIKA Like a Slavic variation on Michael Apted’s “Seven Up’’ series, this quietly affecting documentary examines the lives of five Russians, former classmates, who grew up during the Soviet Union’s final years and are still coming to terms with a life without Big Brother. Some have flourished as entrepreneurs, others eke out contented lives as musicians, still others teach high schoolers the history they themselves were denied. The Jewishness of some is a sub-theme, but Robin Hessman’s film is largely about the helplessness and indomitability of individuals amid earth-shattering events, as the five friends float from the fall of communism to the rise of Putin like sadly philosophical corks. Nov. 14, MFA. (TB)
WO AI NI MOMMY (I LOVE YOU MOMMY) Stephanie Wang-Breal’s documentary looks at Fang Sui Yong, an 8-year-old Chinese girl, and the well-meaning Long Island family who adopts her. The relationship begins poorly but not unreasonably. She’s given a Western name, Faith. She’s full of Cantonese backtalk. She bawls about missing China, and may be a little confused about the younger Chinese sister who was adopted three years before. Upon introduction, Sui Yong looks shell-shocked. For one thing, why is there a camera in her face? Wang-Breal provides translation from behind the camera, which raises all sorts of questions about the filmmaker’s connection to her subjects. But her movie’s best observations are also the most disturbing. China may represent the immediate economic future, but the power of American culture persists. Sui Yong’s “fashion show’’ birthday party is a surreal feat of assimilation: You watch her sashay before her guests and flip her hair for pictures, and think, “Wow. That was fast.’’ Nov. 9, Coolidge Corner. (WM)
FIVE HOURS FROM PARIS A bittersweet romance between a divorced Tel Aviv cab driver (appealing sad sack Dror Keren) and his son’s Russian-immigrant music teacher (Elena Yaralova, her face lovely and lived-in). Leon Prudovsky’s drama graciously lets its duo move toward each other in small, shy steps. Obstacles abound — his fear of flying; her bluff husband (Vladimir Freedman), dead-set on relocating to Canada — and part of the film’s point is how difficult it is for love to take root in a world of surpassing transience, where everyone is coming or going. One of the more deceptively lightweight movies in the festival, this is also one that sticks with you the longest. Saturday, Coolidge Corner; Nov. 13, Arlington Capitol. (TB)
I MISS YOU Fabián Hofman’s drama concerns Argentina’s disappeared revolutionaries during the so-called Dirty War. His movie is set in the mid-1970s and takes the brotherly approach to political insurgency recently used in Italy’s “The Best of Youth’’ and “My Brother Is an Only Child.’’ Javier (Fermín Volcoff) admires his older radical brother (Martin Slipak), who vanishes, leaving Javier to grapple with his family’s grief, his brother’s old friends, and personal upheaval. Hofman combines the ambiguities of coming-of-age with the vagaries of revolution. It’s a gently made, sincerely performed, insightfully executed film. Tuesday, Showcase Foxborough; Nov. 7, West Newton. (WM)
I WAS THERE IN COLOR A missed opportunity. For years, Fred Monosson, a Boston raincoat manufacturer, and his color movie camera made furtive trips to the Middle East, where he recorded seminal moments in the formation of Israel’s nationhood. His footage had been long forgotten until Avishai Kfir discovered it. Why him? His documentary of Monosson’s material is a mess. Kfir overnarrates most of the movie’s 55 minutes and affixes a soundtrack that tries too much of everything: big band, music box, crime TV, dramatic reenactment, historical thriller, soft porn. It’s possible that Monosson was a kind of Zelig figure. His footage deserves a better Woody Allen. Nov. 7, Coolidge Corner. (WM)
LITTLE ROSE (closing-night film) Based loosely on a true story, Jan Kidawa-Blónski’s period melodrama plays like a fusion of “The Lives of Others,’’ Hitchcock’s “Notorious,’’ and “Born Yesterday’’ — not that that’s a bad thing. Shamelessly melodramatic, it casts the lusciously earnest Magdalena Boczarska as a spy in the house of love: The girlfriend of a hulking Polish security cop (Robert Wieckiewicz), she agrees to be courted by and then marry an aging dissident writer (Andrzej Seweryn) whom the authorities suspect of Zionist tendencies. Complicating factor (spoiler alert): The cop is himself a closet Jew. Set during the political unrest of 1968, the film is most intriguing as a character drama about a naive sexpot slowly discovering that she has a heart and political sensibilities. Nov. 14, Stuart Street Playhouse: Nov. 16, Arlington Capitol. (TB)
For additional film descriptions, ticket information, and ticket purchases, visit www.bjff.org. 
