Films often open us up to world that we can only imagine. Fantastical stories, creatures we picture in our minds, they are also cameras into the world we live in today. Places we cannot visit, and realities we only read as news online. In The Voice of Hind Rajab, we are faced strikingly with the brutalities occurring in Palestine today, because in this film, we hear the real phone call recorded of a 6-year-old girl, trapped in a car and begging for help. In this dramatized re-enactment of the volunteers at the Palestine Red Crescent Society attempting to save Hind Rajab from the car as they negotiate with the army to find safe passage, we are faced directly with those lost to the war in Gaza, unable to look away from the realities happening in our own world.

Re-enacted almost word for word, The Voice of Hind Rajab follows volunteers at the Palestine Red Crescent Society, after they received a call about a 6-year-old girl trapped in a car and unable to leave due to gun fire around her. In January 2024, the Israeli ordered the evacuation of a neighbourhood in Gaza, and just 400-meters from their home the girl Hind Rajab and her aunt, uncle, and four young cousins were hit by gunfire, leaving Hind Rajab as the only survivor. Begging the volunteers for help over the phone, it is Hind Rajab’s real voice we hear on the phone, as the actors re-enact the real struggle the volunteers underwent to attempt to speak with the Israeli army to arrange safe passage of an ambulance to the young girl’s location. Tense throughout, dread continues to build that they will never make it, impossible to look away from the horrors that took place 2 years ago, and continue to take place today.

I will first mention that this is a very difficult film to review. In the film, one of the volunteers suggests posting online about Hind Rajab and her call, to try to persuade the army to act faster. Another volunteer reminds them that there are literal images of dying children online, not just their voice on a phone call, and if these images are not calling for an end to the apathy surrounding the war in Gaza, then her phone call may go completely unnoticed. It is difficult to watch a film like this, knowing I can walk away after it ends and continue my life. It is simply too easy to watch this, feel sympathy, and then return to the ease we know. I wonder how much it will spark viewers to make a change, and what good it is doing other than showing us more of the devastating stories that exist every day in Gaza.

On the other hand, the performances and brilliant use of Hind Rajab’s own voice and phone call work to make this story a personal one for us. It is unfortunate how immune we have become to the horrifying images posted online coming out of Gaza, but turning these stories into films makes it that much more personal. We become invested in these characters, who happen to be real people in this case. In a world where we are so selfish and always looking for a way in which stories relate to us, maybe this is what is needed to push us out of our comfort zones and into some form of action, whatever it may be, placing us in the room with the volunteers directly.

If anything, this film is making sure that the world does not forget the name of Hind Rajab. A 6-year-old girl who loved the sea and played with her little brother and had a mother who loved her so deeply. A re-enactment to pay tribute to the real girl, to give her life after death and tell her story, so she becomes more than just another number in a death toll count. So her name is remembered along with her voice and her story.

Along with this, director Kaouther Ben Hania’s brilliant use of Hind Rajab’s real voice never feels life exploitation. Rather, it feels like homage, and a way to place us directly into the helplessness of the situation. Where we see failure coming from afar, but seem to work tirelessly with the volunteers at every stage to help this real girl survive, hoping we can change a history that has already been done. We are haunted throughout the film of the sheer despair of the situation and the helplessness filling the room, but the actors do a stunning job of working with the real life call to show the hard work done in the room that one night, also reminding us of all the volunteers working tirelessly to bring home lives when a whole army is against them.

As difficult of a film as it is to view, The Voice of Hind Rajab is a difficult one to critique. Director Kaouther Ben Hania brilliantly uses the real emergency call of Hind Rajab to place us in the centre of her story, and the helplessness of her situation that feels all to familiar to the stories we hear about online. Succeeding in turning Hind Rajab’s story into a personal one for all of us, one can only hope that her story finds the right audience to help save all the future boys, girls, women, and men of Palestine.

The Voice of Hind Rajab will be released in Toronto on December 25, with a wider release planned for January. Image courtesy of Mongrel Media.