Lake 68

In the early 1960s the Brodzkys, the Baumritters and the Burgins, three families of ideological communists of mostly Jewish origin who remained friends, decided to buy a plot of land at Dłużek lake on the outskirts of Mazury, Poland’s lake district, to build summer homes. But, a wave of anti-Semitism forced the members of the Polish communist elite, who barely considered themselves Jewish, to emigrate from Poland in 1968. Most went to Sweden, Denmark, France, U.S. and Canada, and some to Israel - but before they left, they spent their last weeks crowded into the lake house The documentary was made by Stanisław Brodzki’s daughter, Irit Shamgar, who settled in Israel, as part of a new series entitled ‘Poland–Israel: A New Perspective’. In this intimate film, the Israeli director visits her late father's closest friends - prominent Warsaw journalists and ardent Communists who were among the Jews that Gomulka's Poland expelled. Although many describe themselves as "being from nowhere," the gorgeous cinematography in "Lake 68" helps us understand why the lake is the nearest thing they have to home. They have been meeting here, bringing with them the new generations of their families