With God Against Man

a film by Semyon Pinkhasov – Executive Producer: Roger Yager

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SYNOPSIS

In June 1940, Aristides de Sousa Mendes, the Portuguese Consul-General in Bordeaux, France, issued life-saving visas to thousands of Holocaust refugees in defiance of his government’s direct orders – an action for which he paid a heavy personal price. In June 2013, filmmaker Semyon Pinkhasov followed a group of visa recipient families, along with members of the Sousa Mendes family, as they embarked on a pilgrimage retracing their families’ footsteps of 73 years earlier. They were “searching for Sousa Mendes” – looking for traces and clues of a lost history in an effort to understand their personal pasts. Pinkhasov interweaves the testimonies of the “searchers” with compelling documentary footage and insights from experts to tell this little-known story.

ABOUT THE FILMMAKER

In “…With God Against Man…” Semyon Pinkhasov, award-winning documentary filmmaker, whose films have been shown worldwide at festivals and on television, has turned his focus from sports – He is a former coach of the U.S. Olympic and Maccabiah fencing teams – and the arts to spotlight the heroic acts of Aristides de Sousa Mendes.Past Awards: Sports and Peace Best Documentary – 2012 – New York International Independent Film and Video Festival – Los Angeles Edition What If? The Helene Mayer Story Official Selection – 2010 – 18th Toronto Jewish Film Festival, Toronto, Canada Best Screenplay – 2009 – International Festival of Sport Films, Krasnogorski, Russia Official Selection – 2009 – 27th Milano International FICTS (Sports Movies & TV) Festival, Milan, Italy Official Selection – 2008 – Santa Fe Film Festival, Santa Fe, USA I am not Giordano Bruno Official Selection – 2007 – Festival de Cine de Granada