under the name Leopold, Lahola took an interest in art from a very young age. He was the editor of the Zionist movement’s magazine in Slovakia right up to the Nazi invasion and subsequent occupation when he was then locked up by the pro-Nazi Slovak regime. His family all perished in Auschwitz. During the war, Lahola joined the Jewish Partisans and became part of Slovakia’s anti-Nazi resistance movement. After the war, he started working as a director and playwright, finding success in the field. However; at the end of the 1940s, as antisemitism was on the rise in Slovakia, he took the decision to move to Israel.
In 1951, after directing several commissioned films, the Cameri Theatre premiered Lahola’s original play, Four Corners of the Earth. That same year, he also directed a 20min short marking Israel’s third Independence Day celebrations that was later featured at the Cannes Film Festival. That year also saw the theatrical release of Tent City, one of his most famous films in which Lahola chronicled new immigrants’ struggle to assimilate and integrate. The film was written and produced by Baruch Dienar and featured famed stage actress, Orna Porat. It was shown at multiple festivals around the world, including the Venice Film Festival.
In 1954 Lahola directed his only Israeli feature film, Every Mile a Stone. He co-wrote the script with poet and author, Haim Hefer. When the film opened at the Haifa International Film Festival, critics were less than enthusiastic (to say the least), which mothballed any plans for a commercial nationwide release. Lahola found himself in deep debt after the film’s flop at the box office and consequently fled the country in 1956.
In the sixties, he directed a number of films in Germany including Der Teufel spielte Balalaika (1961) and Duell vor Sonnenuntergang (1965), starring Peter van Eyck and Terence Hill. In 1967, after the Slovak regime had cleared his name, Lahola was invited back to his homeland to direct a film. There, whilst working on the film, Arie Lahola passed away.
