ALFI

Sixteen-year-old Noga has been asked to give a speech for ALFI, the Animal Liberation Front Israel, and the words will not come. Helping her is Lea, an older and more seasoned activist whose conviction Noga admires and whose attention she is beginning to crave. As the two women work through drafts together, the assignment turns into something more personal, and Noga's rhetoric about freedom for every living creature starts to echo her own search for a way to live openly. Raz BDV's Israeli short, which runs about 22 minutes and stars Leila Rose Bari and Bar Ruso, is a quiet coming-of-age story that uses the language of activism to explore first attraction and the difficulty of finding one's own voice. It captures the awkwardness and intensity of a teenager who wants to liberate the world before she has learned to speak for herself.