Wim Van Leer(1913-1992)
- Director
- Producer
- Writer
Wim Van Leer was a Dutch engineer, pilot, playwright, film producer and the scion of a philanthropic family. Wim was a British Royal Air Force pilot in World War II, and later moved to Israel where he was a pilot in the Israeli Air Force. He became a leading industrialist, and in 1952 married Lia van Leer. Together they were the founders of the Haifa Cinematheque, the Israel Film Archive, the Jerusalem Film Festival, as well as Israel's first film archive; the Jerusalem Cinematheque. A Van Leer production was featured at the 1961 Berlin Film Festival, Chris Marker's "Description d'un combat" (1960). His family endowed the Van Leer Institute, a research center in Jerusalem that promotes Arab-Jewish dialogue.
