HATIKVA – EDEN LEVI CAMPANA

From October 7, 2023, to September 7, 2025, seven hundred days pass, and nothing will ever be the same again. During this extraordinary period, we captured faces, voices, gestures; fragments that, once brought together, form a new human mosaic. Each scene was patiently built, filmed with two or three cameras, to simultaneously capture the intensity of the moment and the subtlety of its margins: a glance turning away, a silence settling, a detail usually missed by the eye. This approach gives each account its unique place, while inscribing it into a collective fresco. In the aftermath of October 7, in the aftermath of the pogrom, in the aftermath of the barbarity that claimed more Jewish lives than any event since the Shoah, denialism set in—and with it, the need to restore the facts became unavoidable. Facing the threat of erasure, I chose the only path that seemed possible: that of the camera and information. From the very beginning, HaTIKVAH was conceived as a gesture of Hasbara, in the noble sense: an act of truth. Avi Pazner, former spokesman for six Prime Ministers, told me in an interview for the written press: “Hasbara is about informing the public in Israel and elsewhere. That’s all. The information must be credible, never lie, never exaggerate, never give a false image, but present the situation as it is, from Israel’s point of view.” That is exactly what I wanted to achieve with these films: not to distort, not to disguise, but to give voice to those able to explain, to argue, to place events in their proper perspective. I followed strong voices, capable of saying who the Jews are across their millennia-old history, and of illuminating through these seven hundred days the journey of an entire people. The cinematography matched this writing. In the studio, I chose a restrained palette, slightly desaturated, with precise contrasts. In the field, light reigns supreme: shifting skies, neon corridors, deliberate backlights. I prefer to preserve continuity of atmospheres rather than smooth everything at all costs. A rigorous color pipeline ensures the unity of the two parts: neutral LUTs during filming, consistent grading to preserve skin tones and low shadows, so each part breathes the same air while keeping its singularity. The music, conceived from the writing stage, was reworked during editing as a living material. I move forward by motifs: recurring themes, discreet counterpoints, sustained layers, rare but decisive percussions, voices that emerge — sometimes from the scene, sometimes from outside — until sound overtakes the image before yielding to it again. Silence is never empty: it is a coda. Some sequences are shaped in studio or on sets in Jerusalem, with controlled lights, mastered backlights, dense blacks, and negative techniques to preserve the texture of reality. Others are born as close as possible, handheld, when the moment overflows. For sensitive interviews and investigations, I opt for discreet setups to protect speech and environment. In public spaces—marches, political gatherings, tense zones in Gaza, or pro-Palestinian demonstrations—I favor long focal lengths and fluid movements, to maintain energy without sacrificing clarity. The camera thus becomes a breathing organism, at human height. This alternation fuels the film’s tension: a contemporary tragedy played out in reality. Ethics remain: no invented facts, no fabricated words. When a Member of Parliament from La France insoumise admits that “the importation of the conflict” served his movement, adding, pointing to demonstrators, “last year we were 400; this year, 10,000”—what more is there to say or show? At its core, HaTIKVAH is conducted like an orchestra: each witness is a soloist, each location a resonance chamber, each transition a variation. The film is a constant dance between what is seen and what is silenced, between confession and shadow. That is where it stands: in this cinematic gesture that makes reality its raw material. HaTIKVAH means “hope.” It is the thread linking the two parts, the pulse of the story. But it is also a song, the anthem of Israel and, beyond, of an entire people. Sung in every demonstration filmed, it runs through the images like a common breath crossing borders and eras. Carried by the voice of the narrator, Caroll Azoulay, this melody punctuates the diptych like a leitmotif both intimate and universal, condensing in a few notes the fervor, the pain, and the determination of the witnesses.

Eden Levi Campana