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RAI FILM Festival takes place on 27-30 March 2025. Learn more.

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Hope, Despair and Laughter: A circus project in Palestine

Directed by Ester Hertog

2007 – 27'

Synopsis

Filmed in Dheisheh refugee camp in the West bank, this film is about a circus summer-camp dedicated to bring laughter and hope for Palestinian children. Children are taught all sorts of activities such as juggling and uni-cycling, in a surrounding where the graffiti, monuments for martyrs, and the separation wall are constant reminders of the ongoing political confrontation. How is the conflict inserted into the children’s everyday reality? How is it brought into the circus by ‘real’ events, speeches and symbolic group names? How does the circus project fit in with the children’s hopes and despair?

RAI FILM Festival 2025

The next RAI FILM Festival will take place in person from 27-30 March 2025 at the Watershed Cinema and the Arnolfini International Centre for Contemporary Arts in Bristol (UK) and online throughout the month of April 2025.