User:Amitamythos/Amit Breuer

Amit Breuer
Amit Breuer' is an Israeli-Canadian Award-winning producer, writer and director of documentary films and multi-platform projects. She is the CEO of Amythos Films and Amythos Media and has worked extensively as a producer throughout the world.

Education
Breuer received her B.A. in General History of Art from Tel-Aviv University in Israel from 1981-1983. Breuer completed her Post Graduate in Cinematography at "Beit Tzvi" Institute of Cinema in Ramat-Gan Israel in 1986.

Early Works
Amit spent the early part of her career as a script writer and researcher of documentary films for P.B.S. in Miami, USA and ZDF and Doro Productions in Vienna.

Independent Producer
From 1993 to 1996 Breuer worked as an independent producer for various documentaries including Testimonies; intimate interviews with Israeli men doing military service during the Intifada. Shot during 1989-1991 - the years of the Palestinian Uprising - portray a powerful picture of the price a society ultimately pays for the Occupation. Co-produced with Les Films D'Ici and Channel 4 (UK). The Unpromised Land was produced in 1994 with Director Ayelet Heller, it was produced in association with The Cinema Foundation of Tel Aviv.

In 1992 Breuer produced two 85 minute documentaries of the riveting in-depth interview with Jewish philosopher Yishiyahu Leibowitz called Itgabar, directed by Eyal Sivan and co produced with France 3, Les Films D'ici and Amythos Films.

St.Jean(1993) is the story of the dreams, hope and disillusions of a group of Jewish immigrants from Russia and Ethiopia living in a temporary housing site for Jewish immigrants who according to the Israeli Law of Return have the right to settle in Israel. Directed by Jules Shles, St. Jean won The Wolgin Award for Best Documentary at the Jerusalem Film Festival (1993) and the Israeli Academy Award for Best Documentary (1993).

Mendelssohn Returns to Leipzig(1994) was Breuer's first foray into the roles of writer and co-director with Niza Gonen. A musical and personal journey of the Israeli Piano Trio to Leipzig, hosted by Maestro Kurt Masur, and their musical rediscovery of Mendelssohn, Leipzig and themselves, the film was co-produced by the Mendelssohn Stiftung/Leipzig.

In 1995 Breuer wrote and co-produced, 'On the Edge of Peace' in which three Palestinians and three Israelis were given video cameras to document their lives and the lives of their communities during the turbulent first year of the Israeli-Palestinian peace accords, from the signing of the accords in Washington to the arrival of Yasser Arafat in Gaza. A historic film as it marked the first ever Israeli/Palestinian Co-Production with Thania Productions in Jerusalem and Tamouz Media in New York. The film was shown in many art and political events some including, the Peace Arts Festival in Brussels (1995) and in art galleries in Ramallah, Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, Charlotte North Carolina and Amsterdam.

In 1999 Breuer branched out to produce her first feature length documentary, The Specialist, a courtroom drama which sketches the portrait of Adolf Eichmann, a dedicated bureaucrat, who has tremendous respect for the law and the hierarchy, a Nazi officer, responsible for the liquidation of several million human beings. The film is composed entirely of excerpts from the 350 hours of raw material, filmed in 1961, during the dramatic trial of the Nazi war criminal, Adolf Eichmann, in Jerusalem. The discrepancy between Eichmann's monstrous crimes and his mediocre personality is striking. "Far from an "objective" record of the event, The Specialist indeed captures the "banality of evil" in Eichmann, and that's genuinely frightening" .The film received its world premiere as Official Selection Out of Competition at the Berlin Film Festival (1999), followed by a theatrical release in fifteen countries.

Sumud(2001) chronicles the thirteen year follow up of four children growing up in the Dehiesha Palestinian refugee camp in the West Bank from 1987-2001. This film is an engrossing document about kids growing up under occupation. Breuer worked on the film as executive producer and it won First Prize for Best Documentary at the DOCAVIV (2001)

Independent Creative Producer
Breuer began 2002 by creating The Human Weapon, the first sober, in-depth examination of the complexities of the suicide bombing phenomenon was directed by Ilan Ziv and was co-produced with Point Du Jour, MDR and Arte and garnered second prize at Prix Europa 2002 in Berlin.

“Purity” (2003) was directed by Anat Zuria explores a rare and special look into the world of Jewish religious married life and sexuality, a topic which has hardly been documented: The story of a family purification ritual, a hidden path of struggle for religious women in the framework of strict, masculine religious law that shapes the life of a couple and female sexuality. At the center of this ritual constellation lies a prohibition upon sexual and physical relations between spouses as long as the woman is menstruating or bleeding and for seven days following the cessation of the bleeding. This period of impurity ceremonially ends when the woman immerses, in a strictly regulated manner, in a ritual bath, a mikveh. “Purity” was awarded Best Documentary at the Jerusalem Film Festival (2003), The Jewish Experience, Fipa D’OR for best creative Documentary, Biarritz 2003, Best director, Prague One World Film Festival, 2003, Special Documentary Prize, Dokfest Munich, 2003, Audience Award and Special Jury Prize, Yamagata Film Festival, 2003.

That same year Breuer and her company, Amythos Films, reteamed with director Ilan Ziv to produce “The Junction”, a documentary which investigates and explore the culture of death that feeds the violent convolutions that are currently consuming both Israelis and Palestinians. It is focusing on a specific spot- The Nezarim Junction in the Gaza Strip in a specific moment –The first days of the armed clashes between Israelis and Palestinians in late September 2000. “The Junction” won Best Documentary at the Haifa Film Festival, 2003.

“Checkpoint” (2003) is arguably Breuer’s biggest commercial success was co-produced with Eden Productions and directed by Yoav Shamir. Checkpoint, a grueling Israeli documentary filmed in the occupied territories of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, the film examines the thirty year occupation of Palestinians living under Israeli occupation in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, when traveling from one village or city to another to go to work, to visit relatives, or to get medical treatment, over one million Palestinians must pass through Israeli checkpoints. These checkpoints, essentially the first points of contact between the two people, have an enormous significance in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. From 2001 to 2003, Director Yoav Shamir filmed at these checkpoints; a chilling look at the destructive impact of the occupation on both societies. The film was invited to over 70 festivals around the world and won numerous awards among them: The Joris Ivens Award, International Documentary Festival Amsterdam 2003, Best Feature Length Documentary at HotDocs, Toronto, the Newport Film Festival, the Calgary Film Festival and Special Documentary Award, DokFest, Munich 2003.

In 2005 Breuer re-teamed with Anat Zuria to co-produce Sentenced to Marriage. The film follows the Kafkaesque struggle of Tamara, Michelle and Rachel - three young women doing all that is humanly possible to obtain a divorce, with the help of a group of female orthodox rabbinical advocates. Three young married women trapped in religious courts. They are denied other relationships and are condemned to be barren, because a married woman is forbidden to another man. In Israel, a democratic country of the 21 st century, their pain and suffering is embedded in the law. Being young and anonymous, their voices are silenced. “Sentenced to Marriage” was selected to numerous film festivals around the world. Among them the Jerusalem Film Festival where it won for Best Documentary 2005 and at HotDocs, Toronto where it won the Wolgin Award for Best Israeli Film of the Year.

In 2005-2006 Breuer co-produced the French Canadian documentary, Le Blues de L’Orient/Between Two Notes, a film about the magic of classical Arab music. The film premiered at Festival International de Films sur L’Art (FIFA) in Montreal, 2007 where it won for Best Reportage and was subsequently released in theatres in Toronto, Montreal and France between April and December 2007.

Writer and Director
In 2006 Breuer wrote and directed ''Introitus', a short featuring Maestro Roberto Minczuk and the Calgary Philharmonic Orchestra.

In 2008 Breuer wrote, directed and produced Adventures in Listening a one hour documentary following Kurt Masur, one of the worlds’ great Maestros, as he challenges and teaches the next generation of young musicians and conductors, stretching their limits and transforming their perspectives and abilities. This film is a window into this private and exclusive journey. He also established a Music Institute for young people. We learn about his influences and survival. Breuer also co-produced this film with her company AmythosFilms in conjunction with Tatu Films and Bueno Film Production. The film had its world premiere in the Mendelssohn Hall at the Gewandhaus in Leipzig, Germany in December 2008. This special screening was a first time collaboration between two veteran and prestigious art institutes in Germany; The Leipzig Dok Festival and the Gewandhaus Orchestra.

The film was awarded audience favourite at the DocAviv Festival in Tel Aviv, 2009. In 2009 it was also invited to participate in the FIPA TV Festival in Biarritz, the Jochen Korea Film Festival and Doc Fest of Rome. It was invited to Rio de Janeiro for a special screening at Theatro Municipal in August 2010 and is scheduled for its North American premiere in November 2010.

Multi-Platform
In 2009 Breuer doned another professional hat by deftly slipping into the multimedia genre of production with Love Letters to the Future. Love Letters to the Future is a global transmedia campaign aimed to raise awareness about the rapidly expanding dangers of climate change. Supported by Greenpeace International and a group of NGOs, Love Letters to the Future is a narrative game-like experience across the web, mobile and urban spaces. Supported by Greenpeace International and the Ontario Media Development Corporation’s IDM Fund the cross platform international project was successfully launched in November 2009 and was a finalist at SXSW 2010 Web Awards, Cannes’ 2010 Cyber Lions shortlist and recently won Best Original Program or Series produced for Digital Media- Non-Fiction and Community Campaign of the Year at the 2010 Webby Awards.