'NO OTHER LAND' REVIEW: There's No Turning Off the Television When It's Your Country [5/5]
Palestinian Activist Basel Adra Is the Bleeding Heart at the Centre of This Emotional, Frustrating, Subtly Optimistic Must-See Documentary
[Rating 5/5] - dir. Basel Adra, Hamdan Ballal, Yuval Abraham, Rachel Szor - 2024 - Palestine - R - 1h 32m - Documentary
From the word go. From the first memory. It’s all tanks. It’s all construction vehicles, poised to tear down a home that raised generations. It’s hatred a hillside away.
What happens to a person, or a people, brought up, controlled by the fear not of “if” but of “when”?
One answer is: They make a documentary.
Two of the most important tools in Palestine are guns and cameras.
Israel can stop a lot, but it can’t completely stop the permeation and progression of technology, nor (for long, or completely), more specifically, the Internet.
So we get footage, undoctored, immediate.
Word spreads. Filmmakers Basel Adra, Hamdan Ballal, Yuval Abraham, and Rachel Szor feel the buzz. Maybe it was all worth it. They wonder if maybe their work, capturing deaths, beatings, demolitions, raids, narrow escapes, and a general disregard for humanity and more specifically for their home town of Masafer Yatta, will stir necessary humanity in viewers.
The two “stars” (and co-directors) at the centre of No Other Land, Palestinian journalist-activist Adra and Israeli journalist-activist Abraham, are aware this is their path. They know what they face. They understand the obstacles that have plagued their ancestors and the obstacles that are new to them.
Adra has been living through these problems for decades, the son of the local “gas station guy” and passionate activist. Abraham, with well-intentioned gusto, doesn’t quite have the same context. Coming from Israel, his heart hurts at the idea his people are capable of such monstrous actions; that they are, in a way, committing them in his name. He wants to enter Masafer Yatta and fix every problem at an unrealistic pace. “Get used to failing,” says Adra conspiratorially, during a late night drive. “You’re a loser.” You’re part of the team. Get used to being David against Goliath.
At first it feels as though, for the most part, this is a film comprised of collected footage, semi-structured, solely meant to illuminate life (a life) in Gaza. By its end, however, it becomes a focused, pointed commentary not just on settler violence and colonialism, and not just on human resilience, but on life in the 21st century. The footage is finely layered and composed in a way that does justice to the subjects, even if justice on camera means seeing an atrocity play out in real time, followed by an intimate, wandering debrief.
In one of the most harrowing scenes of No Other Land, a documentary crew visits the mother of a young man who was shot by the IDF (Israeli Defense Forces) and became paralyzed from the shoulders down. She is strong in the face of the camera. She proceeds to provide an abundance of daily stressors, knowing this is a 30 second opportunity for help. The camera man gets what he needs. He thanks the mother, and leaves the tent. She just nods, worn out, alone in the tent that shrouds her son’s cave. Yes, they’re in a tent outside a cave. This is what has become of the town, and of many towns like it. The documentary explains that although the Palestinians who lived there for decades did make use of the extensive collection of caves from time to time, doing so by choice and by force are two very different experiences.
The mother begins to cry into her hands. She becomes less focused on tangible problems and instead expresses aloud she would trade her life for her son’s if it meant he’d be able to walk and experience joy, rather than resentfully endure his existence.
Another brutal moment comes as kids at school see the foreboding parade of CAT vehicles rolling up the path towards them. They scramble to help their teacher bag learning supplies before the forces arive. The IDF closes the door to the school before the kids can leave, forcing them to exit through a broken window like animals.
The IDF counts on us, the viewers, not to care. When a settler comes and mocks Adra for his online activism (“Go write another article”), he knows this.
What he doesn’t know is his smug face is now included in a feature length film, shortlisted for Best Documentary at the 2025 Oscars.
“Go write another article?”
How about a hit documentary?
—
‘No Other Land’ is out some time in 2025. Do yourself a favour and keep track of it.
Selected Movie Quote: “Get used to failing. You’re a loser.”
[Rating 5/5] - dir. Basel Adra, Hamdan Ballal, Yuval Abraham, Rachel Szor - 2024 - Palestine - R - 1h 32m - Documentary