The Israeli anti-war film “The Vanishing Soldier” by Dani Rosenberg will be shown at the Jewish Film Festival Vienna 2025. The Jewish Film Festival Vienna (JFW), which takes place from March 11 to 25, 2025, is celebrating its 34th anniversary this year. Under the motto “Shalom Oida”, the festival will present around 50 feature films, documentaries and short films from eleven countries. The festival opens with the Hungarian feature film “All About the Levkoviches”, which humorously explores the rapprochement between an orthodox son and his secular father. The festival sees itself as a platform for promoting the diversity of Jewish identities, from orthodox to queer. It actively campaigns against anti-Semitism and racism by showing films that highlight the effects of Jew-hatred, war and prejudice, but also emphasize peace initiatives and successful resistance. Particularly noteworthy is the high proportion of films by female directors; around 20 of the works shown are by women and are often dedicated to specifically female life plans. Through its diverse program, the JFW not only contributes to the promotion of Jewish film, but also enriches the international film scene as a whole. It offers insights into the complexity of Jewish life and promotes intercultural dialog, making it an indispensable part of the global film festival landscape.
As part of the Jewish Film Festival Vienna 2025, Dani Rosenberg’s film “The Vanishing Soldier” (2023) will be screened alongside his new work “Of Dogs and Men” (2024), a harrowing semi-documentary film that deals with the events and consequences of the Hamas terrorist attack on September 7, 2023.
The screenings of “The Vanishing Soldier” will take place – in cooperation with THIS HUMAN WORLD Filmfestival – on March 12, 2025, 8:00 pm (Metro Filmkulturhaus HS – followed by a Zoom Q&A with director Dani Rosenberg) and March 22, 2025, 8:00 pm (Metro Filmkulturhaus KS).
UCM.ONE distributes the Israeli film “The Vanishing Soldier” in German-speaking countries on its label Artkeim² both in the original Hebrew version with English or German subtitles, as well as in a German dubbed version under the German title “Der verschwundene Soldat”.
The film about Shlomi, an 18-year-old Israeli IDF soldier who irregularly leaves the troops fighting in the Gaza Strip to flee to his girlfriend in Tel Aviv, is the second feature film by Israeli director Dani Rosenberg (born 1979). The film is an impressive, poetic and existential picture of a youth in Israel, a young generation confronted with the permanent state of national defense and war.
Synopsis
At dawn after a combat mission in the Gaza Strip, Shlomi Aharonov, an 18-year-old infantry soldier in the Golani Brigade, runs away from his unit and the troops. His path first leads him to his parents’ house in the settlement of Sde Uziel in the countryside. He does not meet his parents. When soldiers appear in front of the house, apparently to look for his parents, Shlomi flees on a bicycle. Eventually he arrives in Tel Aviv on a military bus, in which he can travel undetected, where he visits his girlfriend Shiri at work. When Shlomi learns that the military leadership is convinced that he has been kidnapped in the chaos of war, he no longer hides from the soldiers he thought were after him, but from his own identity, which has become a trap. Despite his parents’ pleas to return to his unit before it is too late, Shlomi takes a desperate risk for love – with dramatic consequences. This tragi-comic journey, which takes place over a 24-hour period in the hot and humid streets of Tel Aviv, alternates from horror to hope, from romance to nightmare.
The film celebrated its world premiere at the 76th Locarno Film Festivaland received 11 nominations at the Ophir Awards, including for“Best Film“. “The Vanishing Soldier” was shown at major German film festivals, including the Filmfest Hamburg and the 30th Jewish Film Festival Berlin Brandenburg (JFBB). At JFBB 2024, lead actor Ido Tako received the award for“Best Young Actor“.
About Dani Rosenberg (director and co-writer)
Born in 1979 in Tel Aviv-Jaffa, Israel, he studied at the Sam Spiegel Film and Television Academy in Jerusalem, from which he graduated with honors in 2006.
The short films “Don Kishot be’Yerushalaim” (2005) and “Susya” (2011) were shown at the Berlinale. After working on the medium-length film “Homeland” (2008) and various television series, his feature film ” The Death of Cinema and My Father Too” (2020) was part of the official selection of the 2020 Cannes Film Festival and won the Haggiag Film Prize at the 2020 Jerusalem Film Festival.
His award-winning short films have been screened at prestigious international film festivals, including Cannes Cinéfondation Competition, Berlinale, Clermont Ferrand, HotDocs and IDFA.
His acclaimed television series“Milk & Honey” was successfully adapted in Germany and France. Dani Rosenberg co-wrote a documentary film “Zohar, The Return” and co-wrote Sholem Asch‘s“God of Vengeance” for Israel’s leading theater “The Cameri” in 2018. “The Vanishing Soldier” is Dani Rosenberg‘s second feature film.
Movie details
| Title: |
The Vanishing Soldier
|
| Original title: |
החייל הנעלם |
| Director: | Dani Rosenberg |
| Script / Writer: |
Dani Rosenberg, Amir Klinger
|
| Producers: |
Avraham Pirchi, Chilik Michaeli, Itamar Pirchi, Leon Edery, Moshe Edery
|
| Performers: |
Ido Tako, Mika Reiss, Efrat Ben Tzur, Tikva Dayan, Shmulik Cohen, Yariv Horowitz, Seif Nabul, Mushy Vider
|
| Camera: |
David Stragmeister
|
| Editing: |
Nili Feller
|
| Country of production: | Israel |
| Year of production: | 2023 |
| Productions: |
Israel Film Fund, United Channel Movies
|
| Genres: |
drama, thriller, war drama
|
| Length: | 98 min |
| Language: |
hebrew, english, french (original languages), german dubbed version |
| Subtitles: | English, German |
| Aspect Ratio: |
2.39:1 (2048×858)
|
| Sound: |
5.1 Surround (DCP)
|
| German age rating (FSK) | 12 |
Comments on the film
“In its stirring, restless form, the film finds an image for the only too understandable insecurity of young people who have been given a weapon. In this way, it has become a universally readable anti-war film.” (Frankfurter Rundschau)
“Between the two poles of a love story and a political drama, director Dani Rosenberg weaves a complex, multi-layered portrait of Israeli society in “The Disappeared Soldier”. “(Jüdische Allgemeine)
“The Disappeared Soldier does not relativize the suffering of one side with that of the other. He is concerned with observing a deadlocked state in which his characters react sometimes with patriotic glorification, sometimes with fear and self-doubt, sometimes with paralyzed opportunism.”
(Der Freitag)“Between the two poles of a love story and a political drama, director Dani Rosenberg weaves a complex, multi-layered portrait of Israeli society in “The Disappeared Soldier”, which is locked in a similar bipolarity: the longing for unconditionality (love) is always confronted with a deep existential threat. It could all be over tomorrow.” (Filmdienst)
“The young director Dani Rosenberg stages a pulsating drama with a clear stance, an anti-war film that depicts the Middle East conflict from the Israeli perspective and sharply criticizes the settlement policy of its own government. It shows that the rifts not only run through Israeli society, but also affect the families and friends of a generation growing up in the midst of the conflict.” (EPD Film)
“The Vanishing Soldier” masterfully captures the decisive moment when everything changes, when belligerent patriotism disintegrates into an awareness of the unbearable. A movie that is as pessimistic as it is optimistic, at just the right time for the big questions of our time. (Culturopoing.com)
“Director Dani Rosenberg’s portrait of a lost youth – written and shot between 2022 and 2023 – deals with the repressed reality of the occupation and religious fanaticism in Israel and Palestine. The massacre of October 7 and the Gaza war naturally give the film a completely different relevance.” (arte)
More information about the movie: The Vanishing Soldier
Further information about the film label: Artkeim²
