Memo to Oscar: Just Say ‘No’ to Swag

By Gloria Baran
Published on February 24, 2005

The contrast was just too much. On one channel, I watched as tens of thousands of people struggled to survive the devastating impact of the tsunami that left more than 250,000 dead and countless others injured and homeless, and on another channel, presenters at last month's Golden Globe Awards leaving the ceremonies with their "travel-themed" gift baskets worth $37,890 each.

‘Almost’ a Beginning in Paris

By Tom Tugend
Published on September 16, 2004

It's a bit like that with Holocaust films: The protagonists are either killed or liberated, but if they survive, we do not see how they get back to "normalcy" and cope anew with everyday life.

The modest, low-key French import "Almost Peaceful" ("Un Monde Presque Paisible") remedies this omission.

Merit and Mazel

By Marlene Adler Marks
Published on August 1, 2002

I'll be 54 this weekend. Not for me the modesty of hidden age. I'll take my years, gladly, as I'm given them.

A Nightmare on Wedding Street

By Michele Goldman
Published on July 11, 2002

As a little girl, Anna* always dreamed of a perfect wedding. Then, at 32, after a three-and-a-half-year engagement, she was ready to realize that dream.

Birth of a Jewish Nation

By Yehuda Lev
Published on April 11, 2002

I have been asked by the Hillel Foundation at Dartmouth College to meet with them on the occasion of Israel's 54th birthday. There aren't too many of us still around who were there at its birth, and they would like to hear, from the perspective of a participant, what made it possible for the Jewish state to survive while the Palestinian state, also created by the United Nations, crashed in flames.

Preserving History

By Bram Eisenthal
Published on April 6, 2000

Some five miles outside of Amsterdam, there is a site where a miracle took place during the Holocaust.
Here, in this tiny town with quaint, pretty houses and narrow streets, the Nazis allowed Jewish history to survive. At a time when they were desecrating Jewish burial places all over Europe, they left this one alone.

Insult to Injury

Published on June 5, 1997

Only justice can set them free.