Thursday, October 5, 2017
7:30pm 10:00pm
E Street Cinema
555 11th Street NW
Washington, DC
Website: https://www.dcpfaf.org/program/ghost-hunting
Preceded by ‘Congratulations on the New Wall Paint’ by Wisam Jafari and followed by a discussion on political prisoners.
OPENING FILM // Ghost Hunting
by Raed Andoni | Feature | 93 min. | 2017
A riveting, terrifying recreation of past trauma, Ghost Hunting won the 2017 Glasshütte Original Documentary Award at the Berlin Film Festival. Director Raed Andoni assembles an eclectic group of Palestinian ex-prisoners in order to rebuild the Israeli investigation center in which they were all imprisoned. However, as they were always blindfolded, none of them really knows what the place actually looked like.The result is a shocking, visceral and deeply moving portrait of apartheid.
DISCUSSION // Nearly a million Palestinians have see the inside of an Israeli prison cell since the beginning of the occupation 50 years ago, but their criminalization by the Israeli state dates back to its founding, when refugees attempting to return to their homes were branded “infiltrators” and shot on sight. In a discussion following the film, we explore the toll of mass incarceration on the psyches of former prisoners and their families, the liberation struggle, and Palestinian society at large.