Judy's take on Jewishness

It was a great success and Judy gave up her job as drama therapist to work full time on the project.

Today, the Brighton Jewish Film Festival is in its fourth year, attracting international premires and big names like Stephen Fry and the Rabbi Lionel Blue.

Judy Ironside compares the job of creating the festival to that of a weaver making a carpet of colourful threads.

She says: "Each strand has its own identity and brilliance, yet when woven together, the vibrancy of colour and hue is significantly more dramatic."

Sitting in the equally colourful sitting room of her Brighton home, her love of weaving together different cultural influences and personal experiences is obvious.

The large and sunny room is full of objects picked up on her travels around the world. The old and traditional sit happily next to the new and unique.

It is her approach to life that is echoed in the way she has put together the film festival programme.

It incorporates 30 feature films, documentaries, talks, discussions and exhibitions.

Judy said: "Working on the festival has enriched my view of Judaism.

"I am not a religious Jew but the Jewish culture is very important for me.

"One of the things that particularly interests me about the films is that they show what it means to be Jewish around the world.

"Black Jews in Ethiopia and Australian Jews are all Jewish but their experiences and cultures are so diverse. They break down the notion of Jewish stereotypes.

"I have looked for an equally diverse programme of films to reflect this.

"Films and documentaries have been chosen not only on artistic merit but also if the story they tell is important."

Now in its fourth year, the festival has doubled in size and won National Lottery funding from the regional arts board.

Sir Sydney Samuelson, the first British film commissioner until his retirement, is honorary president and has helped to attract a host of big names in Jewish film to the Brighton festival.

In the first year of the festival, Judy, who has five children, was also working part-time as a drama therapist, helping disabled and troubled youngsters.

But it soon became clear that the film festival required more of her time. She decided to give up her job and devoted herself to the festival, working from home.

She said: "The film festival came along at the right time. I had spent 15 years as a drama therapist and was open to new ideas and a new direction.

"I have always been interested in instigating new ideas. I love a challenge and anything connected to the arts so the festival was the perfect opportunity."

Judy's large and close-knit family is very important to her and because her youngest child is only ten, she found working from home a huge bonus.

She said: "Setting up the film festival has been challenging and exciting. I had to learn a lot but being able to work from home has been the single most important thing which has helped me do it.

"I think it's important that the festival has one committed person to drive it forward but, at the same time, I would have found it very difficult to have someone else collect my youngest daughter from school. I still want to be a central figure in my home and my daughter's life."

She does not feel the leap from drama therapist to film festival director was huge. Both jobs use stories of human experience to educate and entertain.

She said: "I worked a lot with stories, myths and people's own stories as a drama therapist. I think it's important that we share our experiences and our lives.

"Both feature films and documentaries are about people's stories. If film can be used as a starting point for dialogue about different cultures and religions, or to provide a better understanding of your own, then it is important and that's what I hope the festival is."

Judy believes the success of the Brighton Jewish Film Festival is an example of the growing interest in the Jewish culture and of the cosmopolitan and culturally diverse population in the town.

She also believes the festival educates people and helps them open up about being Jewish.

She said: "In the years after the Holocaust, Jewish people were not so open about their lives, experiences and culture - there was a lot of fear around.

"But 50 years have passed and the new generation of Jews is more open and that comes through in their films."

The education programme, built into the festival programme, is a large part of Judy's work and has included Holocaust survivors talking to schoolchildren.

She said: "It is a rare privilege to listen to these people talk about their painful and extraordinary lives.

"But some of the teenagers who come to listen to them have no idea what it meant to be a Jew in those days.

"With xenophobic and neo-Nazi movements gaining strength, it's important that they understand what is happening and how it affects people."

For the past two years, the film festival has also thrown open the design project for the programme and posters to students.

This year, the winner was Micol Kaufer, 24, from the Tel Aviv Centre for Design Studies in Israel. She visited Brighton for the programme launch last week.

She based her work on that of Jewish artist Marc Chagall and included Judaism, film and Brighton in her design.

The Jewish Film Festival is on between November 11 and 25.

One of the main events of the festival is an interview by Sir Sydney Samuelson. He will talk to Topol on Sunday, November 12.

Rabbi Lionel Blue will talk to broadcaster Simon Fanshawe on Sunday, November 19, after the cinema premiere of his new documentary for the BBC's Everyman series.

There will also be a discussion on the plight of the gipsy Holocaust during the Second World War, with speakers Morris Farhi, Jane Haynes and Nicky Jacknowska on November 19.

Programme details of the fourth Brighton Jewish Film Festival, at the Duke of Yorks cinema and Cinematheque, are on the website www.bjewish-filmfest.org.uk