Arna's Children

Duration: 84 Mins Date Produced: 2004 Filmmaker Info Transcript Film Festivals Awards Praise for the Film

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Arna's Children

This personal narrative tells the story of a children's theatre group on the West Bank that was established by Arna Mer Khamis, who grew up in a Zionist family and later married a Palestinian Arab. Directed by Arna's son Juliano, Arna's Children shifts back and forth in time to show the children in rehearsal from 1989 to 1996, and then revisits them later to discover the tragic fates that awaited three of them. Devastating and shocking, the film reveals the tragedy and horror of lives trapped by the circumstances of the Israeli occupation.

Filmmaker Info

Directed by: Juliano Mer Khamis & Danniel Danniel
Produced by: Osnat Trabelsi & Pieter van Huystee
Written by: Juliano Mer Khamis & Danniel Danniel
Camera: Juliano Mer Khamis, Abu Shaada, & Uri Steinmintz
Sound: Alla Khouri & Rani Nentzel
Editing: Obbe Verwer

Film Festivals

Official Selection, 2004 Tribeca Film Festival
Official Selection, 2003 International Documentary Festival

Awards

Best Documentary Feature | Tribeca Film Festival

Related Links

Press Reviews

Praise for the Film

"A must-see documentary. Sure to spark controversy for its straightforward presentation of the Palestinian struggle, [Arna's Children] limns a devastating group portrait of the legacy of occupation."
- Variety

"The documentary takes no sides, but its bleak message is all too clear."
- V.A. Musetto | New York Post

"What begins as a routine documentary about a children's theater group in a Palestinian refugee camp soon turns into a haunting chronicle on the tragic toll of war."
- Robert Dominguez | New York Daily News

"Contains amazingly candid views of warriors behind the scenes of battle."
- David Sterritt | Christian Science Monitor

"The film is both a fitting elegy for Arna and the children she tried to help and a deeply disturbing warning about what will continue to breed within the occupied territories until peace is brought to Palestine."
- Ken Fox | TV Guide's Movie Guide

"Gripping virtually from start to finish..."
- David Nusair | Reel Film Reviews