Educational Media Reviews Online

This film opens up with an unlikely question to two of the interviewees: "Why do you smoke?" Their responses are both humorous and obstinate, gives the viewer an idea of what this film is all about. Jeckes (pronounced Yeck-ahs) are German Jews who fled Hitler's persecutions in Germany and moved to the middle of Palestine in the 1930's and 1940's to help establish the state of Israel. Jeckes were the intellectual elite of German society; as such, the void they left after World War II in the economic and intellectual structure of German society is the focal point of the video. The film's two producers sought to record, through interviews, that part of Germany which is missing today, and which most Germans either avoid or know nothing about.

The name Jeckes is derived from the German word for jackets, apparently because these emigres rarely took their jackets off, even in the sweltering heat of the Middle Eastern desert sun. Once there were over 60,000 Jeckes in Israel; now there are only a few hundred left. The film is accompanied by rather comical and nostalgic music of the 1920's and 1930's. The interviews were conducted in German, which is still the principal language for most Jeckes, even though they know both Yiddish and English. The conclusion of the video, after the two producers interviewed a number of interesting Jeckes, is that there will never be Jewish Germans again, at least not for a long time, and that Israel is more a melting pot of Eastern culture now, rather than a small outpost of Europe as it originally was. For instance, the number of German newspapers, groceries, and shops in Israel grows smaller by the day, as the demand and number of Jeckes decreases.

This is a very interesting video portrays a part of both German and Israeli society that is not very well known. There were two badly spliced sections in the video, during which action was either stopped or interrupted, but otherwise it was well done and the interviewee's stories were both fascinating and filled with humor. Recommend for junior and senior high through adult audiences.