Latest news with #PutYourSoulonYourHandandWalk
Sinar Daily
6 days ago
- Entertainment
- Sinar Daily
'I thought she'd survive': Story of slain Gaza photojournalist touches Cannes
CANNES - A documentary whose main subject, 25-year-old photojournalist Fatima Hassouna, was killed in an Israeli air strike in Gaza weeks before it premiered at Cannes stunned viewers into silence at the festival Thursday. As the cinema lights came back on, film maker Sepideh Farsi held up an image of the young Palestinian woman killed with younger siblings on April 16, and encouraged the audience to stand up and clap to pay tribute. "To kill a child, to kill a photographer is unacceptable," Farsi said. "There are still children to save. It must be done fast," the exiled Iranian filmmaker added. With Israel banning foreign media from entering the besieged Palestinian territory, Farsi last year reached out to Hassouna through video call, and turned more than 200 days of conversations into the documentary "Put Your Soul on Your Hand and Walk". In often disjointed discussions due to bad internet connection, Hassouna smiles widely and bravely says she is ok. She recounts how she dreams of eating chicken amid dire food shortages, how she lost 14 relatives including a one-year-old in Israeli bombardment, and what she photographed that day. In one of her many pictures edited into the film, a little girl laughs on her father's lap in front of a tower block reduced to rubble. But in another, a boy aims a water hose at the bloodied pavement, trying to clean away the remains of his own family. 'Normal people' A day after Hassouna was told the documentary had been selected for a sidebar section at the world's most prestigious film festival, an Israeli missile pummelled her home in northern Gaza, killing her and 10 relatives. Israel has claimed it was targeting Palestinian Islamist militant group Hamas. "Why would you kill someone and decimate an entire family just because she was taking photos?" Farsi told AFP. "They were normal people. Her father was a taxi driver, she was a photographer, her sister was a painter and her little brother was 10 years old", said Farsi. "My heart goes out to her mother, who lost six of her children, her husband and her home." On Thursday, British filmmaker Ken Loach -- a double Palme d'Or winner -- on X called on people to honour Hassouna and fellow Palestinian journalists "who gave their lives to bear witness to mass murder". Tens of thousands have been killed in Gaza and an aid blockade threatens famine, while Israeli leaders continue to express a desire to empty the territory of Palestinians as part of the war sparked by Hamas's unprecedented October 7, 2023 attack. Reporters Without Borders estimates around 200 journalists have been killed in 18 months of Israeli strikes on Gaza. 'Reality caught up with us' As the Gaza death toll mounts, with rescuers saying 120 people were killed in Israeli strikes on Thursday alone, the conflict has cast a shadow over Cannes. Several actors have walked its red carpet wearing Palestinian flags pinned to their jackets, while others have sported a yellow ribbon for Israeli hostages still held in Gaza. Exiled Gazan film makers Arab and Tarzan Nasser will on Monday screen "Once Upon a Time in Gaza", a portrait of two friends set in 2007, the year Hamas started tightening its grip on the territory. On the eve of the festival, "Schindler's List" actor Ralph Fiennes and Hollywood star Richard Gere were among more than 380 figures to slam what they see as silence over "genocide" in Gaza. "The English Patient" actor Juliette Binoche, who heads the main competition jury, paid homage to Hassouna on opening night. Sepideh said she had believed until the very end that Hassouna "would survive, that she would come (to Cannes), that the war would stop. "But reality caught up with us," she said. - AFP
The National
23-05-2025
- Entertainment
- The National
Paul Laverty pays tribute to Palestinian journalist killed by Israeli strike
Paul Laverty, who is known for his collaboration with Ken Loach on I, Daniel Blake, and Sweet Sixteen starring a young Martin Compston, has voiced his outrage at the UK Government's 'collusion with genocide' in Gaza. Ahead of an event in Cannes to remember Palestinian photojournalist Fatima Hassouna who was killed on April 16 in northern Gaza, Laverty shared a video message aimed at UK ministers. READ MORE: Labour silent on Israeli government's 'antisemitism summit' invitation Hassouna, 25, and ten members of her family, including her pregnant sister, were killed just days before her wedding. 'If I die, I want a loud death,' she wrote on social media before she was killed. Hassouna was the subject of a documentary made by Iranian director Sepideh Farsi (below), Put Your Soul on Your Hand and Walk. The film tells the story of the daily life of Palestinians through filmed video conversations between Hassouna and Farsi, was screened at Cannes on May 15. Palme d'Or winners Laverty and Loach also penned an open letter remembering Hassouna as a 'courageous young woman' and urging the international community to speak out about Gaza. In a video clip seen by The National, and due to be screened at a press conference in Cannes denouncing Hassouna's murder, Laverty sent his 'solidarity from Scotland'. (Image: Getty images) 'The genocide convention of 1951, signed by 53 countries is not an option, you are not doing a favour, it is not optional,' he said. 'It is international law, the law of the land. So lets put our politicians on notice that in terms of Article 3 they are in collusion with genocide by directly and indirectly, by the fair view, are supporting genocide in Gaza. 'Let's put them on a wanted list, let's remember their names, all all around the world.' Laverty then called out the UK Cabinet, including Prime Minister Keir Starmer, Foreign Secretary David Lammy and Defence Secretary John Healey. 'We will remember you,' he said. 'Let's put them on a shame and name list, and say we are coming after you in terms of the genocide convention Article 3.' Laverty added: 'We shall remember your name, we shall put you on a list, and we are after you. Carry out your duties in the term of the law, do you duty, stop genocide now. 'Fatima, we remember you darling.' READ MORE: John Swinney discusses 'need to end conflict' in Gaza with Keir Starmer The Foreign Office has been contacted for comment. Laverty and Loach called for the international film community to advocate for peace in Cannes while the festival is underway. 'For a few short days, the world's attention rests on Cannes as film-makers from many countries try their best to make sense of what is happening around them. Cannes has a tradition of engagement in the affairs of the day, and some still have vivid memories of the events of 1968,' they say in the letter. 'Young Fatima clearly foresaw her own murder, and said, 'I want a loud death.' On 15th May, the day of the screening, can we honour this courageous young woman, and her fellow Palestinian journalists (no foreign journalist has been allowed into Gaza) who gave their lives to bear witness to mass murder.' (Image: PA) Laverty and Loach (above) called for countries to carry out their duties under the Genocide Convention and demand the international community 'puts an end to the war crimes of Israel', and named the UK as an enabler. 'If we do not stop Genocide now, the Israeli/Trump version of the Riviera in Gaza will be built on the rubble and the dead,' they added. 'The ethnic cleansing will continue through the West Bank and the Palestinian people will have been finally driven from their historic homeland. 'If the war criminals escape justice what horrors will come next? 'Fatima Hassouna, and her family, murdered on the 16th April, '25, Rest in Peace.'
Yahoo
22-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
‘Put Your Soul on Your Hand and Walk' Review: A Stirring Chronicle of a Gaza Journalist Who Was Killed Before Its Cannes Premiere
Sepideh Farsi's documentary 'Put Your Soul on Your Hand and Walk' follows 25-year-old Gaza photojournalist Fatma Hassona, a story of a woman under siege by constant bombing, made especially sobering by its circumstances. On April 16, 2025, just a day after the movie's Cannes Film Festival selection was announced, Hassona was killed in an Israeli airstrike, turning the film into a cinematic epitaph to a life cut far too short. Farsi takes an unusual visual approach to capturing Hassona, but one that eventually pays dividends. Using one smartphone to film another, the Iranian director creates layers of distance between the audience and her subject — or rather, mimics the actual divide between the two women — during their many WhatsApp video chats. Farsi cannot enter Gaza, and Hassona cannot leave, leaving pixelated calls with delayed audio (owing to Hassona's poor internet connection) as their only way to connect. More from Variety Elle Fanning Wipes Away Tears as Palme Buzz Builds for Joachim Trier's 'Sentimental Value,' Scoring Massive 15-Minute Cannes Ovation 'Sentimental Value' Review: Joachim Trier's Resonant Family Drama Treats a Beautiful Old House as the Foundation for Healing 'A Useful Ghost' Review: A Haunted Vacuum Cleaner Hoovers Up Attention in Pleasingly Particular Ghost Story There likely would have been clearer, more traditional options to shoot this footage, between the possibility of screen-recording, or perhaps using Hassona's own DSLR camera, but opting for a lo-fi mise en abyme has a dueling effect. On one hand, it keeps Hassona tragically out of reach, the way she was for Farsi during their year-long conversation, beginning in April 2024. On the other hand, the moments in which Farsi inserts Hassona's photographs on screen become all the more striking. Her pictures of Palestinian death and survival, amid the rubble of bombed buildings, reveals a soulful command of shadow, composition and focus, which stands out in stark contrast to the blurry video chats. However, the calls themselves are the crux of the movie, and prove immensely alluring despite their poor quality. Hassona, in her broken English, narrates her life and daily circumstances, from her family being starved to the danger of falling bombs as soon as she walks out the door to her dreams of one day escaping Gaza and traveling to Rome. However, despite the death and destruction around her, she delivers each bit of news and information with a radiant grin, attempting to stay positive and laugh off even the most inhumane horrors. During several calls, the audio is interrupted by choppers and drones overhead and bombs falling on neighbors' houses. At one point, she turns her camera to a pillar of smoke nearby, where a residential building had stood just moments earlier. These heart-wrenching images are given greater political context as Farsi films her laptop in between calls (or while waiting for Hassona to call back, after a call has been dropped) while news videos about Gaza and Israel play on loop. All the while, Farsi remains a subject too — a helpless observer to these events, reduced to a mere shape via her reflection in her smudged computer screen. She asks Hassona for her opinions as well, which the young photographer once again delivers with a smile, even as she unpacks her complex feelings about the larger situation. These details, however, pale in comparison to the seemingly inconsequential anecdotes Hassona narrates about her daily life, each time with a different hijab to match her outfit, or a different pair of shades or glasses. Hassona is both fashionable and immensely talented (she shares her Arabic poems and songs with Farsi), and the more we see of her over the movie's 110 minutes, the more devastating it becomes that we will never meet her, or never truly get to know her. The proximity of her killing to the Cannes Film Festival likely means that little has changed in the film, except for an added scene and acknowledgment near the end. But even so, Farsi's aesthetic approach — which could have so easily been grating — proves endearing and heartbreaking in equal measure, as a depiction of the exact manner in which a filmmaker got to know her subject intimately before her death. Despite its tragic outcome, the film proves stirring in its capacity for hope against all odds, while also placing on full display the cost of occupation, portraying the full extent of the lives and dreams dashed by war. Best of Variety The Best Albums of the Decade
Express Tribune
16-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Express Tribune
From Gaza to Cannes
Fatima Hassouna died in an Israeli air strike before her documentary premiered at Cannes. Photo: File A documentary whose main subject, 25-year-old photojournalist Fatima Hassouna, was killed in an Israeli air strike in Gaza weeks before it premiered at Cannes stunned viewers into silence at the festival Thursday, reported AFP. As the cinema lights came back on, film maker Sepideh Farsi held up an image of the young Palestinian woman killed with younger siblings on April 16, and encouraged the audience to stand up and clap to pay tribute. "To kill a child, to kill a photographer is unacceptable," Farsi said. "There are still children to save. It must be done fast," the exiled Iranian filmmaker added. With Israel banning foreign media from entering the besieged Palestinian territory, Farsi last year reached out to Hassouna through video call, and turned more than 200 days of conversations into the documentary Put Your Soul on Your Hand and Walk. In often disjointed discussions due to bad internet connection, Hassouna smiles widely and bravely says she is ok. She recounts how she dreams of eating chicken amid dire food shortages, how she lost 14 relatives including a one-year-old in Israeli bombardment, and what she photographed that day. In one of her many pictures edited into the film, a little girl laughs on her father's lap in front of a tower block reduced to rubble. But in another, a boy aims a water hose at the bloodied pavement, trying to clean away the remains of his own family. 'Normal people' A day after Hassouna was told the documentary had been selected for a sidebar section at the world's most prestigious film festival, an Israeli missile pummelled her home in northern Gaza, killing her and 10 relatives. Israel has claimed it was targeting Hamas. "Why would you kill someone and decimate an entire family just because she was taking photos?" Farsi told AFP. "They were normal people. Her father was a taxi driver, she was a photographer, her sister was a painter and her little brother was 10 years old", said Farsi. "My heart goes out to her mother, who lost six of her children, her husband and her home." On Thursday, British filmmaker Ken Loach – a double Palme d'Or winner – on X called on people to honour Hassouna and fellow Palestinian journalists "who gave their lives to bear witness to mass murder". Tens of thousands have been killed in Gaza and an aid blockade threatens famine, while Israeli leaders continue to express a desire to empty the territory of Palestinians. Reporters Without Borders estimates around 200 journalists have been killed in 18 months of Israeli strikes on Gaza. 'Reality caught up with us' As the Gaza death toll mounts, with rescuers saying 120 people were killed in Israeli strikes on Thursday alone, the conflict has cast a shadow over Cannes. Several actors have walked its red carpet wearing Palestinian flags pinned to their jackets, while others have sported a yellow ribbon for Israeli hostages still held in Gaza. Exiled Gazan film makers Arab and Tarzan Nasser will on Monday screen Once Upon a Time in Gaza, a portrait of two friends set in 2007, the year Hamas started tightening its grip on the territory. Exiled Gazan film makers Arab and Tarzan Nasser will on Monday screen Once Upon a Time in Gaza, a portrait of two friends set in 2007, the year Hamas started tightening its grip on the territory. On the eve of the festival, Schindler's List actor Ralph Fiennes and Hollywood star Richard Gere were among more than 380 figures to slam what they see as silence over genocide in Gaza. The English Patient actor Juliette Binoche, who heads the main competition jury, paid homage to Hassouna on opening night. Sepideh said she had believed until the very end that Hassouna "would survive, that she would come (to Cannes), that the war would stop. "But reality caught up with us," she said.
Yahoo
16-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Pedro Pascal and Juliette Binoche add their names to Cannes letter condemning 'genocide' in Gaza
Earlier this week, a group of more than 350 international actors, directors and producers signed a letter published on the first day of the Cannes Film Festival condemning the killing of Fatma Hassona, the 25-year-old Palestinian photojournalist and protagonist of the documentary Put Your Soul on Your Hand and Walk. Hassouna was killed along with 10 relatives in an Israeli air strike on her family home in northern Gaza last month, the day after the documentary was announced as part of the ACID Cannes selection. The signatories included Pedro Almodóvar, Ruben Östlund, Guy Pierce, Ralph Fiennes, Melissa Barrera, Yórgos Lánthimos, Susan Sarandon, Alfonso Cuarón and David Cronenberg. They denounced genocide in Gaza: "We cannot remain silent while genocide is taking place in Gaza," read the letter initiated by several pro-Palestinian activist groups and published in French newspaper Libération and US magazine Variety. 'We are ashamed of such passivity.' The letter also urged cinema to use its art form to 'draw lessons from history, to make films that are committed' and to be 'present to protect oppressed voices.' Now, 60 more artists and celebrities have added their names to the letter condemning the film industry for its 'silence' over the ongoing and deadly impact of Israel's military campaign in Gaza – including this year's Cannes jury president Juliette Binoche, Pedro Pascal, Guillermo del Toro, Noémie Merlant and Omar Sy. Other new signatories also include Riz Ahmed, Tomas Alfredson, Carter Burwell, Robin Campillo, Camille Cottin, Adèle Haenel, Jim Jarmusch, Michael Moore, Alice Rohrwacher and Peter Straughan. Read the full letter below: Fatma Hassona was 25 years old. She was a Palestinian freelance photojournalist. She was targeted by the Israeli army on 16 April 2025, the day after it was announced that Sepideh Farsi's film 'Put Your Soul on Your Hand and Walk,' in which she was the star, had been selected in the ACID section of the Cannes Film Festival. She was about to get married. Ten of her relatives, including her pregnant sister, were killed by the same Israeli strike. Since the terrible massacres of 7 October 2023, no foreign journalist has been authorised to enter the Gaza Strip. The Israeli army is targeting civilians. More than 200 journalists have been deliberately killed. Writers, film-makers and artists are being brutally murdered. At the end of March, Palestinian filmmaker Hamdan Ballal, who won an Oscar for his film 'No Other Land,' was brutally attacked by Israeli settlers and then kidnapped by the army, before being released under international pressure. The Oscar Academy's lack of support for Hamdan Ballal sparked outrage among its own members and it had to publicly apologize for its inaction. We are ashamed of such passivity. Why is it that cinema, a breeding ground for socially committed works, seems to be so indifferent to the horror of reality and the oppression suffered by our sisters and brothers? As artists and cultural players, we cannot remain silent while genocide is taking place in Gaza and this unspeakable news is hitting our communities hard. What is the point of our professions if not to draw lessons from history, to make films that are committed, if we are not present to protect oppressed voices? Why this silence? The far right, fascism, colonialism, anti-trans and anti-LGBTQIA+, sexist, racist, islamophobic and antisemitic movements are waging their battle on the battlefield of ideas, attacking publishing, cinema and universities, and that's why we have a duty to fight. Let's refuse to let our art be an accomplice to the worst. Let us rise up. Let us name reality. Let us collectively dare to look at it with the precision of our sensitive hearts, so that it can no longer be silenced and covered up. Let us reject the propaganda that constantly colonizes our imaginations and makes us lose our sense of humanity. For Fatma, for all those who die in indifference. Cinema has a duty to carry their messages, to reflect our societies. Let's act before it's too late. When asked about the open letter at the Cultural Council in Brussels earlier this week, French minister of culture Rachida Dati told Euronews: 'It is their role to engage and to have a commitment. I believe that culture and politics go hand in hand. It can be exceptional, when we are committed to creative freedom - because as you know, at the moment there are more and more attacks on creativity. That's why I want to create a senior civil servant for creative freedom.' She added: 'I have taken measures to prevent these attacks on creativity, including many programmers and curators who no longer want to select films. There is more and more self-censorship when it comes to programming. And so, we have to commit to this freedom of creation, we have to prevent obstacles to the freedom of creation, and artists have a role to play in taking sides, in mobilising in relation to what is happening in the world.' Concluding, she shared: 'Personally, I'd be very surprised if the cultural and artistic players weren't mobilised and committed. That's what culture and politics are for. It is said that music softens morals - culture can also save the world. So, I think that everyone is doing their part.'
