The Voice of Hind Rajab Review (2025 BFI London Film Festival)
As the initial intertitles tell us, The Voice of Hind Rajab takes place in Gaza on the 29th of January 2024, when Omar A. Alqam (Moraz Maltese), one of the volunteers at the Red Crescent in Palestine, receives an emergency call from Hind Rajab, a 6-year-old girl who is trapped in a car under fire in Gaza. The closest ambulance, and the only emergency team remaining in north Gaza, is only 20 minutes away, but the Red Crescent cannot deploy them before going through a series of approvals and protocol, overseen by Mahdi Aljamal (Amer Hlehel).
As the hours pass, tensions grow amongst the Red Crescent volunteers as Hind’s life is on the line, and both Rana Hassan Faqih (Saja Kilani) and Nisreen Qawas (Clara Khoury) is trying to reassure her. But The Voice of Hind Rajab is no fictional story, as the movie immediately points out, “this dramatisation is based on real events and emergency calls recorded that day.”
The film mixes the fictionalised retelling of the events that happened in January 2024 with the real audio footage of Hind’s call to the emergency services. This is particularly successful as it immediately draws our attention to the fact that Hind’s story is not fictional; this really happened, which makes it even more devastating and enraging. Director Kaouther Ben Hania had previously used a blend of commentary and fiction in her previous film, Four Daughters, and that experience undoubtedly affected the way documentary footage is used in this movie. This also happens towards the end of the film when the director cleverly works in the actual footage of the emergency response services talking to Hind and her mum in one of the most pivotal scenes.
When it comes to portraying such a heartbreaking and devastating real-life story, it is admittedly hard to focus or even pay attention to the technical elements and formal choices that make the film what it is. And yet, all of these are excellently used to tell this important story with urgency and emotional power. Thanks to the tight focus on a few individuals, it also adds a personal element to the movie by bringing in the audience emotionally through a deep connection with the main characters. Saha Kilani, Clara Khoury, Moran Maltese, and Amer Hlehek are all excellent at portraying their respective characters and the way each of them is affected by this tragedy.
From the very beginning of the film, the tension and stakes are delivered very well. As soon as Omar gets the very first emergency call, the urgency and stakes of this story become immediately clear: this is about saving a five-year-old girl and doing it as quickly as possible. As the movie goes on, it constantly keeps the audience informed of the time passing and the location of the ambulance and the injured girl. Not only does it explain to its viewers the slow and complicated protocols and the emergency situation in Gaza, but it also makes them experience the agonising wait for approval and a sense of powerlessness in front of a life being taken away.
But The Voice of Hind Rajab is not just a film, it is a real story. While movies can often allow us to escape the horrors of reality by immersing ourselves in a new world for about two hours, Kaouther Ben Harris reminds us of these horrors that are happening every day in front of our eyes. In the face of such tragedy, our only choice is to listen. By the time the film ends, the viewers cannot help but feel a sense of despair and anger towards the real-life war against Palestine and its people.
Overall, The Voice of Hind Rajab is a heartbreaking and admittedly hard watch, a very necessary one that reminds us that such horrors did happen, and are still happening, every day in Gaza, with countless lives lost. Its genre-bending cinematic techniques, approach to documenting reality, and revolutionary potential make it a unique and groundbreaking film.
★★★★★
Screening at the 2025 BFI London Film Festival from October 16th, 18th and 19th / In UK cinemas on January 16th / Amer Hlehel, Clara Khoury. Motaz Malhees, Saja Kilani / Dir: Kaouther Ben Hania / 12A
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