Bringing together a collection of some of the best short films to emerge from Palestine and about Palestinians this year, including drama, documentary and animation.

On This Land
Dir: Slawek Rzewuski
Experimental | 5 minutes | 2019

With a mesmerising score this experimental short brings a rhythmical cinematic questioning to a cycle of violence, and lends the protesters of Palestine a choreographed beauty.

Laymun
Dir: Catherine Prowse and Hannah Quinn
Animation | 5 minutes | 2018

This stop motion paper cut animation is set in a Middle Eastern city, where a woman defies the violence and destruction around her and tries to inject life and hope into her home, by growing a lemon garden.

The Pipe
Dir: Sami Zarour
Fiction | 10 minutes |2019

Haunting isolation and the need for a connection blur the lines of reality, and leave a prisoner between two states. But as he loses control, his identity gets clearer.

Strange Cities Are Familiar
Dir: Saeed Taji Faroukhy
Fiction | 20 minutes | 2018

Ashraf has been a political refugee in London for 30 years, spending his days in his study or at the local social club. One day he receives devastating news from Palestine. As Ashraf struggles to return to his homeland, his memories become a burden and a reminder of his failures and mistakes.

Salam
Dir: Claire Fowler
Fiction | 13 minutes | 2018

Salam is a woman, a Muslim, a Palestinian-Syrian, a New Yorker and a Lyft driver who navigates the night shift while waiting to hear life or death news from her family in Syria.

Teta, Opi and Me
Dir: Tara Hakim
Documentary | 25 minutes | 2018

Shot entirely on an iPhone, Teta, Opi & Me is a tender and poetic film, which follows the intricacies of the director’s playful process as she reveals and celebrates her grandparents’ enduring romance through social, political and racial adversity.

And An Image Was Born
Dir: Firas Khoury
Fiction and Animation | 9 minutes | 2017
Two year old Razi loves to hear the story of The Monster. The story is an allegory of the Palestinian problem but he is too young to understand the politics – he just wants to imagine and live through its details over and over again. The narrator has his own film in his head.

Boiler Room: Palestine Underground
Dir: Jessica Kelly
Documentary | 28 minutes | 2018

Palestine Underground documents the resilience of a burgeoning music scene, undeterred and fuelled by political restrictions, building bridges through a shared sound and identity.