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Our Film Folk by Herbert G. Luft —HOLLYWOOD Menachem Golan and Yorum Globus are chairman and presi dent respectively, of the Los An geles-based Cannon Group, the largest independent production and distribution company with an an nual gross of half a billion dollars, operating on three continents and making movies in Hollywood, Paris, Rome, London, and of course in Israel, their home base. Golan, at 56 in the prime of his life, just as his younger cousin Globus, was born in a small town of Tiberias, a community with a population of 10,000 with one school, one synagogue and one cinema. 1 met Golan in the spring of 1965 at the Israeli Consulate in Los Angeles when the late Rabbi Max Nussbaum introduced him to me as the producer of “Sallah.” We talked about his mentor, producer Roger Corman, whom 1 had known for many years as the successful director of low-budget films. We also discussed Corman’s camera man Floyd Crosby, who, on a loan-out. had done the outstand ing photography of “Sallah.” As chairman of the International Film Committee of the Hollywood Foreign Press, 1 was contacted six months earlier by a New York dis tributor by the name of Kissner, who as an importer of foreign- lah” for Golden Globe considera tion. Since this was the very first film from Israel offered to us as an entry, I was eager to accept, but Kissner phoned back saying that the Hebrew-language film wouldn’t have a chance and he was replacing the entry with an Italian one. I insisted on “Sallah,” a picture written and directed by Hungari an-born Ephraim Kishon, Israel’s most versatile author of books and plays who had gained international reputation. I screened the film for our membership and introduced Chaim Topol, the then 28-year-old actor portraying the 75-year-old Sallah. The picture won a Golden Globe award. This was the first time an Israeli film was so honored on American television. Golan, meanwhile, had written a letter to me indicating that he was the producer of the film and when he came weeks later, we expressed our regret that he had missed the Golden Globe presentation. The youthful Israeli film maker had worked with Roger Corman as a member of the crew on “The Young Racers” writing at the same time his first screenplay, “El Dora do” which he directed in Israel with Gila Almagor and Topol. In 1963, he formed Noah Films with his cousin Yoram Globus and produced “Sallah,” which was brought to the attention of the American public by receiving a Golden Globe award. During 1965 to 1971, Golan/ Globus produced such pictures as cle,” “Daughters, Daughters,” “The Highway Queen” ar.d “Tevye and His Seven Daughters,” the latter a dramatic, Hebrew-language film. In 1972 and 1973, the pair pro duced and Moshe Misrahi directed the Israeli films, “The House on Chelouche Street” and “l Love You Rosa,” both of which were nominated for Oscars by the Acad emy. When Golan came back to Hol lywood in 1973 with his musical “Kazablan,” he phoned me to meet him in Beverly Hills, at which time he told me that the sentimental story of a Moroccan immigrant (portrayed by Yoram Gaon) had broken all box-office records in Israel. MGM picked up the pic ture, the first Hebrew-language film to be distributed by a major com pany. In 1975 Golan directed in Eng land “What’s Good for the Goose” with Norman Wisdom; the next year, “Diamonds,” starring Robert Shaw and Shelley Winters. In Hol lywood, Golan made his debut as director of “Lepke,” an unhealthy picture dealing with the Mafia leader Buchalter and starring Tony Curtis. I watched some of the shooting at the MGM backlot and was impressed with Golan’s vitality. In 1977, back in Israel, Golan made the stirring Hebrew-language film about Entebbe, entitled “Oper ation Thunderbolt,” which was nominated for an Academy Award. The following year, in Hollywood, plan to make the filmic version of “The Magician of Lublin,” by Isaac Bashevis Singer, a work he had talked with me about four years earlier. In 1979, Golan/Globus bought the controlling interest in the Can non Group; a year later the first subsidiary London-Cannon Films. Among others, the company pro duced “Lady Chatterley’s Lover” and “Death Wish II,” the latter starring Charles Bronson. By 1982, Cannon had a line-up of 18 films headed by the powerful adaptation of the Pulitzer prize-winning drama, “That Championship Season,” with “10 to Midnight,” “Sahara,” “The Wicked Lady” and the highly con troversial “Bolero” starring Bo Derek. IS^USED IE AT ARTLJ • Credenus • Sofas • Desks • Folding Tables • Chain • End Tables • Bookcases • Conference Tables • Files • Storage Cabinets • Club Chain • Typing Tables .. .and More! 1860 Cheshire Bridge Rd. N.E. (404) 872-8925 gP OFFICE SUPPLIES & FURNITURE New Furniture (oented at. 1851 PIEDMONT RD NE« ATLANTA. GA 30324 language films, offered me “Sal- “Escape to the Sun,” “The Mira- Golan fulfilled his long-cherished S&fro&U&b " t <itV - FAMOUS ITALIAN FOOD - Lunch and Dinner • Good Drinks • Open 7 Days Dancing in Quiet, Casual Atmosphere Featuring Vocalist Gayle Short, Friday, Saturday Sunday from 9:00 p.m. Big Band Sound of The Don Miolla Band, Sunday Nights 120 COPELAND ROAD, SANDY SPRINGS • 843-9750 Jewish group to help Holocaust rescuers by Margie Olster NEW YORK (JTA)—The direc tor of a new foundation to aid needy Christians who rescued Jews during the Holocaust said many of the rescuers live impoverished lives and face persecution for their war time activities. Eva Fogelman, director of the Foundation to Sustain the Right eous Christians, told the JTA that the project aims to raise funds to ease their living conditions and provide a network of social sup port for these neglected heroes of European Jewry. Founding chairman Rabbi Harold Schulweis conceived the idea after studying the importance of rescuers in terms of educating about the Holocaust, Fogelman said. Schulweis has studied the res cuers since the early 1960s and Fogelman directs a rescuer research project at the City University of New York Graduate Center for Social Psychology. Both have met rescuers in Israel, Canada, the United States and Europe in the course of their re search and have learned first-hand of their indigence and abuse, both I rom Jewish and non-Jewish communi ties. Even in Israel, where rescuers ostracized by their communities in Europe for helping Jews relocate. the 31 rescuers now living there have not always been hailed for their deeds. Just recently, Fogel man noted, the Knesset voted to raise the scant pensions for rescuers. But money is not the only diffi culty these Christians face in the Jewish homeland. Fogelman said she knows of several cases where Jewish children in religious neigh borhoods taunted the rescuers— by calling them “goyim”—and in one case physically attacked and almost killed an 80-year-old res cuer who converted to Judaism. Perhaps less astonishing, the rescuers often conceal their war time activities from their neighbors in European communities for fear of this type of abuse. The first task of the foundation will be locating the rescuers. Some 4,000 appear on a list at Yad Vashem in Jerusalem. Others can be located through the testimonies of survivor organizations to locate rescuers and reunite them with the people they saved. The international effort of the foundation will also seek out other social support organizations to serve as extended families for lonely rescuers of all countries. Finally, the foundation will raise funds to improve the living condi tions of the needy rescuers and possibly sponsor a group of res cuers to travel to Israel and be re united with survivors. -^:; Co ^o niia ^ I 8 Pr ' Ce ° n ^e re e TjT?i OurZ^J the . . ' he o' Q ° re Let Vs C L rea G "e OS o co q ,i°oZ lor ° '°w er • 5 Sh *w you ' ° rc °"*by • j-oyout |y e • Com.ro Wo . € ° n dofl Typ —n„g • F/„. r , ® r och or os reorive ln4 > • Botinets Cr»i-w ’ W «W-" 9 lnvi>ofio ng 9£D£ps/non 1 Fift, !!"**'»»>, n.w. PAGE 21 THE SOUTHERN ISRAELITE Aufuat 22, 1986