MVFF47 - RSVP Guide

Bay Area directors create warmly emotional odes to family members’ World War II travails. Allie Light’s The Ship That Turned Back chronicles late spouse Irving Saraf’s childhood escape from occupied Poland; Jeanne C. Finley’s Red Boat Crossing recalls her mother’s dramatic Red Cross service. Two treasured longtime Bay Area filmmakers’ new mid-length films memorialize family members’ tumultuous experiences during World War II. Jeanne C. Red Boat Crossing utilizes archival footage, miniatures, narration, onscreen text, and experimental techniques to recreate her mother Cecily Barker’s service as a psychiatric social worker for the battle-wounded on a Red Cross vessel. It’s an admiring tribute to quiet heroism that’s equal parts documentary and poetical reverie. Oscar®- and Emmy-winner Allie Light’s The Ship That Turned Back also draws on a mix of elements in letting late husband-collaborator Irving Saraf recall his Jewish family’s harrowing flight from Nazi-occupied Poland. It took them from Vienna to Trieste to Malta, then finally Palestine, dodging bombs and the custody of opposing armies en route. These “nerve-wracking adventures” (as his father put it) somehow left the then-7-year-old Saraf’s humor intact, as his playful recollections attest.

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