Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #16471 in DVD
• Released on: 2005-11-29
• Rating: NR (Not Rated)
• Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
• Formats: Closed-captioned, Color, DVD, NTSC
• Original language: English, Arabic
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 76 minutes

Customer Reviews

"From the moment I could hear, I could hear shooting."
During the Arab-Israeli War in 1948, 750,000 Palestinians were forced to leave their homes and now--almost 60 years later--there are about 5 million Palestinian refugees. The film "Until When" examines the Palestinian refugee problem by focusing on people who live in the Dheisheh Refugee Camp (one of the 59 Palestinian Refugee Camps)--located near Bethlehem in the occupied West Bank. The fact that over 11,000 refugees are squashed into the 1/2 square kilometer camp does not stop the refugees from living vibrant lives--even in poverty and hardship. Filmmaker Dahna Abourahme personalizes the plight of the 1000s of refugees by interviewing a handful of residents from the Dheisheh Camp.

One of those interviewed is Sana--a young woman deeply committed to community work--especially women's rights, and she commutes a long way to work each day. She describes how she used to used route 60 to go to work, but now that is a road that only settlers can use, and she is forced to take make a circuitous, tedious journey instead. In spite of the fact that her life is difficult, she maintains a remarkable ability to rise above hardship and philosophically asserts, "We were born into politics."

Another focus of the film is 13-year-old Fadi, who assumes responsibility for his four younger brothers when their mother travels to work as a housecleaner in the Jewish Gilo settlement. Although strikingly poor, the boys manage to maintain a buoyancy and optimism that is admirable.

A fair portion of the film focuses on a young married couple--Emad and Hanan who have a small daughter. They attempt to raise her with a 'normal childhood' by trying to protect her from the violence and war that surrounds them. The camera catches the child playing 'tanks' with her toys, so it seems as though some images of war have seeped into her childhood despite her parents' best efforts. The child's father, who was jailed at age 12, describes the difficulties of living in the camp. For example, they receive water for only 3 days out of every 15, and on windy days, electricity is cut off in the refugee camp.

The close-knit, multi-generational Hammash family includes elderly members who remember the property they once owned, and one elderly man bemoans the lack of trees in the Dheisheh Camp while recalling the trees on their former family home. And two young sisters charmingly engage the camera with their hopes and dreams of the future.

All those interviewed express their opinion on the Right of Return, and in one scene, three maps illustrate the startling reality of the ever-shrinking Palestinian land. "Until When" is in Arabic with English subtitles and will be of interest to anyone concerned with Human Rights and the ever-constant question of the fate of the Palestinian people--displacedhuman

A superb movie everyone should see
A very well-presented documentary on the Palestinian issue through various refuge camp inhabitants of varying ages. It is a shame that the only way someone would stumble across this movie is if they were specifically looking for something on this issue...and then, of course, wanted to know/understand a well-rounded view of the Palestinian situation.

A phenomenal film that I wish could be seen in theaters.

the humanity of a people denied by Western media
Along with other Palestine themed documentaries such as "encounter point" and "promises" this simple and most effective and heartwarming work entitled "until when" brings to viewers a personal humanity of the Palestinian people that is so absent from the American/British/Canadian and other Western media. The total contrast between the racist contempt shown toward the people of Palestine by the current US candidates for President on our current TV screens and the undeniable humanity and personal integrity of these Palestinian people revealed within this 2004 shot documentary.

When Hillary Clinton visited Israel-Palestine during the time of her Senate race she boasted to her voters in NYC that "I refused to meet with those people!" .

Here are in this documentary "those people" that not one US candidate for President is willing to visit and sit in a living room or kitchen with and listen to their experience, issues, hopes, needs and pleas.

The notion that any of the current candidates should be allowed to parade themselves as "peace-brokers" without being laughed out of the room, is one that reflects the total unreality of the American and Western political mindset.

Buy the DVD of this documentary...for the record it is NTSC and ALL REGION so it will play on any DVD player on the planet.

Here are in this beautiful documentary the human beings that have their right to humanity denied by the bigotry and slander of the television news media.