Film Based on Port Resident Nets Academy Award Nomination

If it’s Oscar season, it must mean yet another reason to root for a Port Washington resident. That’s because “In Darkness,” a Polish film based on the life of Port resident Kristina (Chiger) Keren, was nominated for Best Foreign Film on Tuesday.

Directed by Agnieszka Holland ("Europa Europa"), the film depicts the true story of Jews in 1943 living in Lvov, Poland, who escaped the Nazis by seeking refuge in sewers.

Keren is a longtime Port Washington resident. She, her family and 17 others spent 14 months in hiding, surviving on the food and supplies brought to them by Leopold Socha, a sewer inspector. Keren, 76, is the lone surviver of the group, according to a New York Times article. That same article reported that she migrated to Israel in 1957, and then later to the United States, where she became a dentist; her husband Marian, is also a Holocaust survivor. 

Her son practices dentistry at in Port Washington.  

Making the nomination even more of a Port story, Keren penned her experience in the book, "The Girl in The Green Sweater," co-written by local author . 

This is the second year in a row that a Port native has made Oscar news. Last year, , won an Acadamy Award in the Best Live Short Action Film category.

No doubt many residents on the peninsula will tune in with keen interest this year to the 84th Academy Awards, Sunday, Feb. 26, on ABC.