Venice filmmakers stand in silence for Duma victims
Speaking from film festival, 'Rabin' producer Amos Gitai says he hopes his movie makes people 'prepare for the future'
Filmmaker Amos Gitai, whose latest film, “Rabin, The Last Day,” is one of 21 films competing for the Golden Lion in the Venice Film Festival, called for a moment of silence in memory of Riham Dawabsha, 26, the third member of her family to die as a result of a firebombing attack on her family home in the Palestinian village of Duma in July.
“Let us rise up and stand in memory of the mother from the Duma village, the last victim of hatred, and in memory of all the victims,” he said at the press conference for his film.
The Duma attack was attributed by Israeli army sources to Jewish extremists, though no arrests have been made yet.
“Rabin, the Last Day” uses a combination of archival footage and scenes with more than 70 actors to portray the final moments of Yitzhak Rabin’s assassination in November 1995, and then looks closely at the aftermath of the tragedy.
In a combination of press clips from the festival shown on “Good Evening with Guy Pines,” Gitai spoke about his reasons for making the film.
“I made it not just as a filmmaker, but as a way of looking at the past in order to prepare for the future,” he said. “Film is a way of making people think.”
Gitai said that he believes Rabin’s assassination was more dramatic for Israel than John F. Kennedy’s was for the US because Israel is still entangled in its conflict with the Palestinians.
“When I asked Shimon Peres if we would have peace if Rabin had not been killed, he answered, ‘Yes, yes, yes, yes,'” said Gitai.
The commercial release of the film will take place on November 4 in Tel Aviv, the 20th anniversary of the former prime minister’s death.