Aws Al-Banna Ahmed Al-Danf Basil Al-Maqousi Mustafa Al-Nabih Muhammad Alshareef Ala Ayob Bashar Al Balbisi Alaa Damo Awad Hana Ahmad Hassunah Mustafa Kallab Satoum Kareem Mahdi Karera Rabab Khamees Khamees Masharawi Wissam Moussa Tamer Najm Abu Hasna Nidaa Damo Nidal Mahmoud Reema Etimad Weshah Islam Al Zrieai
Masharawi Fund For Films & Filmmakers in Gaza Coorigines Production Metafora Production Sharjah Art Foundation International Media Support Akka Films The Royal Film Commission Doha Film Institute
From Ground Zero (Arabic: قصص غير محكية من غزة من المسافة صفر, romanized:qiṣaṣ ghayr maḥkiyya min Ghazza min al-masāfa ṣifr, lit.'Untold stories of Gaza's Ground Zero') is a 2024 anthology film directed by 22 different Palestinian directors.[4] The film is made up of 22 short films, including documentaries, fiction, animation and experimental films about the current situation of the people of the Gaza Strip in the midst of the Gaza war.[5]
After the start of the Gaza campaign,[clarification needed] film director Rashid Masharawi founded the Masharawi Fund for Cinema and Filmmakers in Gaza with the purpose of supporting young Palestinian filmmakers to express themselves and tell their stories through cinema.[10] Masharawi supported the production and post-production of the 22 short films that make up From Ground Zero filmed in different parts of the Gaza Strip at the end of 2023.[11]
Release
The film was scheduled to have its world premiere at the 77th Cannes Film Festival, but was pulled by organizers on "political grounds".[12] In response, Masharawi held a screening via projection outside the festival grounds in protest.[13] It had its official world premiere on July 5, 2024, at the 5th Amman International Film Festival,[14] then screened in mid-July 2024 at the 70th Taormina Film Festival,[15] on September 9, 2024, at the 49th Toronto International Film Festival[16] and on September 28, 2024, at the 17th Toronto Palestine Film Festival.[17]
Critical response
On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, 98% of 48 critics' reviews are positive, with an average rating of 8/10.The website's consensus reads: "An eclectic collection of short films that capture both the joy and pain of a people persevering through wartime, From Ground Zero has a cumulative emotional impact that proves unforgettable."[18]Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 83 out of 100, based on 13 critics, indicating "universal acclaim".[19]
Matt Zoller Seitz of RogerEbert.com gave the film four out of four stars, praising it as a "staggering achievement" not just for being completed but also for expressing that "after a catastrophe, art is not only still possible but necessary". He stated that "We don't always understand the connections between people within individual stories and have to intuit them.... Rather than being confusing, this has a universalizing effect. We feel it could happen to us, too, or that it is happening to us, thanks to the empathy machine aspect of cinema storytelling." Seitz concluded that "Even amid so much murder and destruction, the urge to create abides. For all its horror and sadness, this is one of the most hopeful films I've ever seen."[20]
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