Documentary, 1h 11m

R21 comes as an addition to and a reflection on a collection of 20 16mm films, safeguarded in Tokyo by the Japanese solidarity movement with Palestine. It’s an undelivered solidarity letter written by a Japanese activist that was lost on its way to a Palestinian filmmaker. Fragments of the letter are found throughout the collection and compiled into an imagined structure that reveals itself during the film.

R21 AKA Restoring Solidarity acts as a catalog, the film as a time machine, the film as an archive. The themes that Reel no. 21 deals with, reveal themselves in the form of a montage essay. At the same time, the act of restoring these films brings out motives, aspirations, and the disappearance of a generation and its struggles, not only in Japan, but around the world.

Director: Mohanad Yaqubi

Writers: Rami El Nihawi, Mohanad Yaqubi, Lisa Spilliaert

Narration: Lisa Spilliaert

Editing: Rami Nihawi

Camera: Casey Asprooth-Jackson

Sound Design: Raf Enckels

Grading: Lennert De Taeye

Produced by: Sami Said, Mohanad Yaqubi

Researchers: Reem Shilleh, Fadi AbuNe’meh