Kaouther Ben Hania
La voce di Hind Rajab

LA RECENSIONE

This is not a review; I wanted to write one but I just can't.

It is not possible to review a film that is not a film, not a documentary, and perhaps not even cinema, but rather an act of grief. It cannot be done according to the classic standards by which we review or comment on a cinematic work. Any opinion about the direction, the shots, the acting of the cast would only diminish the immense civic and moral value of this film.

I will limit myself to just one consideration: we never directly see the horror experienced by this six-year-old girl, crushed by the gears of this absurd and irrational death machine. It is not the images (that is, the primary force of cinema) that speak to us, but only a voice, represented by a white line on a black screen. And paradoxically, this negation of the essence of cinema proves to be the (forgive me for this ugly term, I couldn't find another) most powerful weapon to make us understand the monstrosity of what happened.

Allow me a very brief aside, slightly off-topic. A few days ago on a television program, a so-called president of a friends-of-Israel association, replying to someone lamenting the massacre of children happening in Gaza, said: "mi definisca bambino." The answer comes like a scream from the cinema screen, and it is called HIND RAJAB.