(Sept. 28) – Italian Cinema will take part in the Toronto Palestine Film Festival (TPFF), which aims to contributes to the city’s thriving multiculturalism by sharing with Torontonians the untold Palestinian cultural, historical and personal narratives. In collaboration with the Italian Institute of Culture, the Italian presence will be represented by three movies. The award winning “Gaza Hospital”, by Marco Pasquini, recounts the story of the Beirut’s Gaza Hospital, established as the primary medical center at the crossroads off the Palestinian Sabra and Shatila refugee camps in the 1970s. Thirty years ago, this building witnessed one of the darkest chapters in Lebanese and Palestinian history, the Sabra and Shatila massacres. Today, the war-scarred building is home to hundreds of Palestinian refugee families, who are protagonists of the story in which the Gaza Hospital emerges as a symbol of hope and resistance. “Arcipelago” by Giacomo Abbruzzese, a short about a young Palestinian who enters Israel illegally by passing under the Wall and through the sewers to get to his work in a restaurant in West Jerusalem. On his day off, Abed decides to go home with a mysterious white box. It marks the beginning of a long journey. The third one is “This Is My Land… Hebron” by Giulia Amati and Stephen Natanson, is a footage captured by filmmakers, residents and activists and it documents the daily struggles of Palestinians resident in Hebron trying to live their lives among their hostile neighbors. (red)
