Constructed from a personal archive of footage shot by director Kamal Aljafari in 2001 during the Second Intifada, With Hasan in Gaza follows Aljafari's journey as he searches for a man he was once imprisoned with. Accompanied by Hasan, the grainy, intimate lens of a MiniDV camera captures the everyday rhythms, conversations, and spirit of Gazan life amidst a backdrop of conflict, creating a rare cinematic snapshot of a specific time and place.
More than a simple travelogue, the film transforms into a profound meditation on memory, loss, and preservation. By rediscovering and assembling the footage decades later, Aljafari engages in an act of cinematic resistance and creates an homage to a Gaza that has since undergone profound erasure. A powerful testament to the people and spaces that endure in memory, using the medium of film to restore their presence and assert their continued existence. (Bethan Hughes)