TIFF Bell Lightbox, Cinema 2

Put Your Soul on Your Hand and Walk

Duration: 110 min Director: Sepideh Farsi Genre: Documentary Year: 2025
Country: France, Iran, Palestine Languages: English

Description:
At the beginning of the genocide, Iranian-exiled director Sepideh Farsi naively sought a way into Gaza to cover the unfolding genocide. In the course of her failed mission, a contact connected her with acclaimed Palestinian photographer and poet Fatma Hassona. While the two had differing views on religion, Middle East politics and exile, their curiousity of each other’s lives resulted in an unlikely friendship over the course of their regularly scheduled glitchy video calls. Put Your Soul on Your Hand and Walk offers an intimate, first-hand perspective on life under genocide in Gaza, through the video calls between Sepideh and Fatma. Tragically, Fatma was killed with her family, in a targeted Israeli airstrike on her home on April 16, 2025 - just one day after she celebrated the announcement of the film’s selection at Cannes. Combining raw immediacy with deep humanity, the film portrays daily life during the genocide through the eyes of a young Palestinian caught in a lifetime of Israeli military aggression and siege.

Cast: Fatma Hassona
Awards: Cannes