Directed by Ilana Trachtman
2007, 87 minutes
Distributed by First Run Features
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About the Film
An engrossing, wrenching, and tender documentary film, Praying with Lior introduces Lior Liebling, also called “the little rebbe.” Lior has Down syndrome, and has spent his entire life praying with utter abandon. Is he a “spiritual genius” as many around him say? Or simply the vessel that contains everyone’s unfulfilled wishes and expectations? Lior—whose name means “my light”—lost his mother at age six, and her words and spirit hover over the film. While everyone agrees Lior is closer to God, he’s also a burden, a best friend, an inspiration, and an embarrassment, depending on which family member is speaking. As Lior approaches Bar Mitzvah, the Jewish coming-of-age ceremony, different characters provide a window into life spent “praying with Lior.” The movie poses difficult questions such as what is “disability” and who really talks to God? Told with intimacy and humor, Praying with Lior is a family story, a triumph story, a grief story, a divinely inspired story.
About the Producer/Director
Ilana Trachtman is an award-winning documentary and children’s television producer. She has produced and directed programs in both English and Spanish for PBS, HBO, Family, ABC-TV, Showtime, Lifetime, Discovery, Trio Network, A&E, Thirteen/WNET, the Biography Channel, and Sesame Workshop.
Ilana is especially interested in character-driven cinema vérité. She recently directed two episodes of Texas, Ranch House, the PBS reality/documentary series set in 1867. Other favorite projects include the film, Our Heroes, Ourselves (Lifetime), a documentary special hosted by Marlo Thomas, which profiles four grassroots women heroes with the goal of empowering viewers to become heroes in their own lives. The program won a Cine Golden Eagle, a Telly Award, and the Woody Harrelson Environmental Award. For Biography, Ilana produced, directed, and wrote specials on Sylvia Plath and Bram Stoker, and for the Trio Network, she directed the series 24 w/, a highly stylized “day in the life” program capturing some of pop culture’s most interesting icons (including Vera Wang, Damon Dash, and Tina Brown).
Ilana also has an extensive background in producing and directing programs for children. She recently produced the Spanish version of Sesame Street’s Talk, Listen, Connect: Helping Military Families Cope with Deployment. For HBO Family, she conceived and co-produced My Favorite Book, a sixty-episode children’s series in which five- to seven-year-olds tell their own versions of classic picture books. The series includes interviews with over 500 children. Other credits include What’s Going On: Child Poverty in America for Showtime, profiling hunger and homelessness in the lives of Appalachian and urban children. For ABC-TV, she produced and directed two editions of ABC Children First, a magazine-style documentary series for parents. Her program, the Arts Advantage, about daring arts education programs around the country, received a Telly Award and an award from Media Rights, the online companion to the Human Rights Watch Film Festival.
During two years on the staff of Thirteen/WNET’s City Arts (now called Egg: The Arts Show on PBS,) Ilana received three New York Emmys and many nominations. She produced the special Working Actors, co-produced the special Tales from the Book Trade, and developed stories for over one hundred documentary segments about the contemporary art world. Praying with Lior is her first independent film.
Click here to read an interview with Ilana Trachtman, Director of Praying with Lior
