Latest news with #DavidCunio
Yahoo
14-02-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Tom Shoval & Nancy Spielberg Discuss Gaza Hostage Film ‘A Letter To David' & Why Berlinale Is Right Place For World Premiere
David Cunio and his twin brother Eitan were at the Berlin Film Festival in 2013 as the stars of Israeli director Tom Shoval's first feature Youth which world premiered to acclaim in Panorama. The pair, who hail from the Nir Oz Kibbutz in southern Israel, played brothers who kidnap a young woman using a military service-issued rifle in an ill-advised scheme to raise funds to pay off family debts. More from Deadline Thai Studio Night Edge Unveils Horror Pic 'Death Dial' Starring Actress Penpak Sirikul & Sanya Kunakorn - EFM Tilda Swinton Plans A Break From Acting & Addresses Berlin Attendance Despite Boycott Calls Berlin Film Festival 2025: All Of Deadline's Movie Reviews The story was pure fiction but the fraternal bond on the big screen was real. A decade later David Cunio was kidnapped in the October 7, 2023 Hamas attack with his wife Sharon Aloni Cunio and twin daughters from their home in Nir Oz, where around 180 of the some 400 residents were either killed or abducted that day. His wife and children were released in November 2023, but close to 500 days later David Cunio has yet to be released, with the family clinging to the hope that he is still alive somewhere in Gaza. His younger brother Ariel was also abducted and is yet to be freed too. They are among 73 hostages still unaccounted for in Gaza, with Israeli intelligence suggesting that 38 are still alive, while 35 are presumed dead. Shoval is back in Berlin this year with his very personal film A Letter To David, capturing the essence of his kidnapped friend and the trauma of brother Eitan, wife Sharon and parents Silvia and Jose Luis Cunio. Mixing extracts from Youth; footage of the development and shooting of the film, and interviews with family members, the cinematic letter adds flesh and blood to the man now staring out of 'Bring Him Home' posters. The film is produced by Maya Fischer, Alona Refua and Roy Bareket at Jerusalem-based Green Productions, Shoval's long-time producers on Youth and second feature Shake Your Cares Away, and Nancy Spielberg under her Playmount Productions banner. Spielberg, whose EP credits include Aulcie and We Will Write Our History, connected with the production through friend Jake Paltrow, with whom Shoval co-wrote Adolf Eichmann trial drama June Zero. Deadline talked to Shoval and Spielberg about the film as it world premieres at the Berlinale. DEADLINE: A Letter To David TOM SHOVAL: After 7th October, I was in contact with Silvia Cunio. It was very chaotic. Nobody knew what to do and what was really happening. It was kind of fresh and overwhelmingly frightening. She was saying to me, 'Can you help us raise our voice so we will be heard, and people will know what is happening.' My immediate response was to tap into my cinema circuit, using the fact that David had been in my film… I felt helpless but I started thinking and went back to Youth. It occurred to me that a lot of elements in the film echoed what was happening. David and Eitan are the kidnappers and there's this hidden horror in the movie that we touched on, but we didn't know what we were touching on. The film has changed. I can't see it in the same way anymore. I went into the editing room and tried to make an essay and then I realized it had to be more, that I wanted to shout, and that I wanted to do it for David, and this became the basis of this cinematic letter, A Letter to I really wanted to show the film in the Berlinale. Of course, I feel a bit tense because the situation is so fragile, and people are so emotional. The film is very personal, but a lot of people will look at it through a very broad perspective. I know that there may be a clash but the film, even if it's personal, belongs in the cinema. We're closing some sort of a circle. Youth premiered in the Berlinale and David was here, getting all the attention. This is kind of closure and hopefully by doing this closure, we will get a brighter future and David here, with all the other hostages alive and well. SPIELBERG: We're all on shaky ground. One of the things that makes us all tremble is that the world is so divided, so polarized. If we can't get to a place where we can listen to each other, how are we ever going to heal? How are we ever going to move forward when everybody is fighting, screaming, without even bothering to listen? What I like about this film and what I'm hoping is that we do break it down to humanity and trying to understand what a person looks like and not a label. DEADLINE: SHOVAL: In the process of thinking about this film, I found a kind of a hidden treasure, a box with a lot of unedited material, intended for a kind of PR film showing the process of turning David and Eitan from non-actors to actors. We gave them cameras to capture their lives in the kibbutz. All of a sudden, I was transported back in time somehow and it became part of the film and part of the letter. DEADLINE: SHOVAL: I get chilled every time I see these moments. It was like we were dancing or playing. We didn't feel anything violent. It was an illusion. When you see it now, you see the violence, you can't escape it. And in my imagination, I'm asking myself where is David now? What is happening to him now. You imagine a lot of horrible stuff and you don't want it to be like that. The film is also looking back at what it is to do cinema, and this connection between cinema and reality. DEADLINE: SHOVAL: I was in constant conversation with the family the whole time because I didn't want to anything they did not want to do. They were on board from the start, also we had known one another for many years. I was very gentle with all of them. I was always saying, 'If at any given moment, you do not feel comfortable, just tell me and we'll stop, or do it another way.' DEADLINE SHOVAL: I knew from the beginning that I didn't want to do that. The moment we got these waves of violent and harsh footage we you couldn't see anything else. It makes you blind, and you lose the human perspective of what is happening. You had posters of people kidnapped and these condensed images of horror. I wanted to break out of this and show the person behind this tragedy, not some fragmented vision from surveillance cameras with images of the terrorists. DEADLINE: SPIELBERG: I was in Israel 7th October. It was the most frightening experiences of my life. As an American, what can I compare it to? 9/11, maybe but just because I live in New York and sort of close to the World Trade Center. In this case, I was told to lock myself in a safe room because nobody knew whether the terrorists were coming. It was a scary experience. From the minute it happened, all we did was watch all that footage, and unfortunately, it does have such a devastating effect. All the trauma gets repeated over and over again, and you're almost fuelling this fear and anxiety on a minute-by-minute basis. I do documentaries. I tell stories. I wanted to tell a 7th October story the same way that I've worked on Holocaust films. I think every story is important. Everything has to be documented, but I also didn't want to go down that route of the brutal footage that was out there. Jake Paltrow said you need to hear about Tom's project. It was the right answer for me. It was a way to take this down to the individual and to really focus on this incredible life and this wonderful person. We all have this innocence of when we were at the height of our lives, weddings and eating an orange in the orchard and goofing around with our friends and little do we know what is waiting down the road for us. Nobody imagines this is waiting in our wildest imaginations. DEADLINE: SPIELBERG: We're all very connected. The whole production team is wonderful. Roy and Maya and Alona, they're just all so collaborative. I wanted to be the non-Israeli set of eyes. I wanted to be the American audience, to be there to say. 'The rest of the world maybe doesn't know the Cunio family.' DEADLINE: SHOVAL: It's been a dilemma from the start but we want to keep him in existence, we don't want him to disappear. At a certain point, when there was no deal, people were just walking past the posters, it was becoming part of life, routine. I can't deal with that. I can't comprehend that. Me and the family want his voice to heard. Of course, we're very worried, but this is one of the tools we have. DEADLINE: SHOVAL: All I can say is that I believe we need to do everything we can until the last hostage is free and every one of them out of there, no matter what it takes what, this is the only way to go. DEADLINE: SHOVAL: No violence. I just want a deal to be made done, and as soon as possible. There is really no time. Best of Deadline 'Severance' Season 2 Release Schedule: When Do New Episodes Land On Apple TV+? 'Captain America: Brave New World' Primer: What To Remember Ahead Of The First Marvel Film Of 2025 The 25 Highest-Grossing Animated Films Of All Time At The Box Office
Yahoo
13-02-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Vigil for Hamas Hostage Israeli Actor David Cunio Held on Potsdamer Platz as Berlinale Opens
A group of artists and filmmakers held a vigil Thursday on Berlin's Potsdamer Platz, as the Berlin Film Festival kicked off, to call for the release of David Cunio, an Israeli actor who was one of the hostages kidnapped by Hamas on Oct. 7, 2023, from the Nir Oz kibbutz. Cunio is also the subject of the documentary 'A Letter to David,' by filmmaker Tom Shoval, which premieres Feb. 14 in the Berlinale Special section. More from Variety Trailer for WW2-Set Drama 'The Pianist's Choice' Starring 'The Substance' Actor Unveiled by Sales Company Loco Films at the EFM (EXCLUSIVE) Julio Medem's '8,' at This Year's EFM, Explores 90 Years of Spanish History Through Two Intertwined Lives Selma Blair to Star in Supernatural Thriller 'Silent,' Architect Launching at EFM (EXCLUSIVE) The group behind the vigil, called Bring David Home Now, has published on open letter whose more than a hundred signatories includes directors Michel Franco and Ari Folman, Jennifer Jason Leigh, and German stars Iris Berben and Andrea Sawatzki, and prominent producer Max Wiedemann. 'As the Berlin Film Festival takes place in the city of Berlin for the 75th time, we would like to remind festivalgoers that there is a captive with ties to the festival who is still held hostage inside the tunnels of Hamas somewhere in the Gaza Strip,' the letter said. 'Mr. David Cunio starred in the film 'The Youth' in 2012, which won a special prize in the Berlinale that year. He was a special guest of the festival and must have had fond memories of it,' it added. The letter explained that 'like hundreds of other Israelis, David was kidnapped on Oct. 7, 2023, from his home, along with his wife and their 3-year-old twins. Their house was burned to the ground. David's wife and children were released after 52 days in captivity. David's brother Ariel was also kidnapped along with his girlfriend Arbel. She was recently released after 15 months of complete isolation. However, the two Cunio brothers are still held somewhere inside the tunnels of Gaza.' As the film festival starts, and Berlin becomes full of life and art, we call for the immediate release of David, his brother Ariel, and the many dozens of Israeli hostages who are being held in the tunnels of Gaza. We pray that one day David would be able to visit Berlin and enjoy it again,' the letter concluded. Best of Variety New Movies Out Now in Theaters: What to See This Week Grammy Predictions, From Beyoncé to Kendrick Lamar: Who Will Win? Who Should Win? What's Coming to Netflix in February 2025
New York Times
29-01-2025
- Politics
- New York Times
Hamas Is Expected to Release 8 Israeli and Thai Hostages
Hamas will release eight hostages on Thursday — three Israelis and five Thai nationals — after more than a year of captivity in Gaza, the Israeli government said Wednesday night, as the fragile cease-fire between the two sides held through its second week. The Israeli hostages slated for release include Gadi Moses, 80; Arbel Yehud, 29; and Agam Berger, 20, according to the Israeli authorities. In a statement on social media, Hamas confirmed the three Israelis would be freed. Neither Israel nor Hamas named the Thai citizens who would be released. Under the terms of the cease-fire, Israel is expected to release more than 100 Palestinian prisoners in exchange for the hostages released on Thursday, including around 30 serving life sentences for involvement in deadly attacks against Israelis. The release is the third so far as Israel and Hamas observe a six-week truce, part of a multiphase agreement that mediators hope will end the war in Gaza. More than 45,000 people were killed there during Israel's campaign against Hamas, according to Gazan health officials, who do not distinguish between civilians and combatants. During the 42-day initial cease-fire, Hamas committed to freeing at least 33 of the remaining 97 hostages in Gaza in exchange for a partial Israeli withdrawal and the release of over 1,500 Palestinians jailed by Israel. Under the terms of the deal, Ms. Yehud — one of the last living women held hostage — was initially supposed to be freed last week. When she was not released then, Israel responded by delaying the passage of hundreds of thousands of displaced Palestinians from returning to their homes in northern Gaza, as the agreement stipulated. The Israeli military allowed them to proceed after mediators announced on Sunday that they had secured a commitment for Ms. Yehud's release. All of the eight captives expected to be freed next were abducted during the Hamas-led Oct. 7, 2023, surprise attack on southern Israel that began the war. Roughly 1,200 people were killed during the assault, mostly civilians, and another 250 were taken hostage, according to the Israeli government. Two of the Israeli hostages are from Nir Oz, an Israeli community near the border with Gaza that was one of the hardest-hit by the Hamas-led attack. More than 65 people were taken hostage from Nir Oz and dozens more were killed. Mr. Moses, a farming expert, was abducted from his home during the Hamas assault. His partner, Efrat, was killed during the attack, likely by an Israeli helicopter that fired on a vehicle that was ferrying militants and hostages, according to the Israeli military. Ms. Yehud was kidnapped, as was her partner, Ariel Cunio and the family of his brother, David. David Cunio's wife, Sharon, and their two children were freed along more than 100 other hostages during a weeklong truce in November 2023. Ms. Yehud's brother Dolev was killed during the attack, according to the Israeli military. Ariel and David Cunio remain in Gaza. Ms. Berger, a young military conscript, was abducted during Hamas's assault on Nahal Oz, the military base where she served as a lookout. Four of the other lookouts taken hostage during the attack were released on Saturday. Mousa Abu Marzouk, a senior Hamas official, confirmed in a phone interview that the five Thai workers would be released on Thursday. The Thai workers were being held by Palestinian Islamic Jihad, he said, referring to a smaller militant group in Gaza distinct from Hamas. Thailand's ambassador to Israel, Pannabha Chandraramya, also said five of the eight remaining Thai hostages would be released on Thursday, although she said it was not yet clear which ones would be freed. Ms. Chandraramya said that six living and two dead Thai hostages in Gaza, all aged between 28 and 42, remained in Gaza. All were abducted on during the Hamas-led attack in 2023 from four farms close to the Gaza border, where they were employed as agricultural workers, she said.
