No. 030 - 'Put Your Soul On Your Hand And Walk' by Sepideh Farsi (2025)

Watched by Matthew Donlan at Dendy Newtown

If there is only one documentary you watch this year, make it Put Your Soul on Your Hand and Walk.

The independent documentary by Sepideh Farsi premiered at the usually overlooked ACID section of this year's Cannes Film Festival with global attention. Jury President Juliette Binoche recognised the film during her opening night speech stating 'it is a powerful testimony of our lives and dreams'. On the day before the Cannes Festival opened, the film precipitated an industry-wide letter, with over 300 signatories condemning Israel's invasion of Gaza and the Academy's silence during the kidnapping and torture of Hamdan Ballal, Academy-winning director of No Other Land.

Why? How did this film lead to such an outcry and praise? In the middle of this film's story and subsequent release sits a tragedy. A tragedy that has become so familiar yet never fails to break your heart.

25-year old photo-journalist Fatima Hassouna is the subject of the film. Through video calls with the director she tells of daily life in Gaza during Israel's invasion and indiscriminate bombing. The film ends in April 2025. On 15 April, as they regularly would, the two women jumped on a video call. Farsi shared the news with Fatima that their film had been selected to premiere at Cannes and they discuss travel plans for Fatima to attend. On 16 April, the next day, Fatima and nine members of her family were murdered in the middle of the night by an Israeli airstrike.

With this knowledge, you watch the film with a delicate observation. It begins with Farsi travelling to Egypt in 2024 to document the flow of Palestinian refugees into the nation. Through a mutual friend, Farsi is put in contact with Fatima who lives in Northern Gaza with her family. Across the next year, Farsi records their video calls as we watch their friendship grow. With tenderness and concern in her voice, Farsi asks about how Fatima feeds herself, how she sleeps, how her family are coping. With every response, unwavering even as she details her malnutrition or how she found the decapitated head of her aunt in the rubble, Fatima speaks of her concern for others. She's concerned for her brothers and sisters, her friends, her neighbours. She asks for nothing for herself except prayers and for someone to listen to her.

Throughout the entire film you, like Farsi, are left shocked by how positive Fatima remains. Each phone call opens with her beaming smile, her cheers for joy at seeing a friend again. Despite an unreliable internet connection causing buffering and regular disconnections, the pair persevere. She says time and again that she is hopeful for a peaceful Gaza. She speaks of her wishes for a rebuilt Gaza. Intercutting these phone calls are photos taken by Fatima of collapsed buildings, missile craters and, often, children in the street with beaming smiles like Fatima's.

The film's title comes from a quote from Fatima, describing the experience of leaving her home amidst Israeli airstrikes. It is an act of defiance so simple yet so essential to life in Gaza. Each day she would place her life in the hands of fate and carry herself through the day. While watching, it felt like her soul had been placed in our hands too, and the world had let it fall.

Put Your Soul On Your Hand And Walk is screening at Golden Age, the Ritz, Dendy and Palace cinemas.

Fleapit Pick of the Week

Test Pattern Presents is a brand new film club in Sydney committed to the weird, unusual and off-kilter films from around the globe. They're kicking things off at Golden Age this week with a new restoration of Linda Linda Linda, the 2005 cult-classic from Nobuhiro Yamashita. Details are available here.

Screenings: Thursday 20 Nov. - Wednesday 26 Nov.

NEW RELEASES:

• Put Your Soul On Your Hand And Walk (Sepideh Farsi, 2025)
• Jay Kelly (Noah Baumbach, 2025)
• Wicked: For Good (Jon M. Chu, 2025)

Cinema Astragale
I've Heard the Ammonite Murmur (Isao Yamada, 1992)
Thursday

Laneway Cinema
Can't Hardly Wait (Deborah Kaplan, Harry Elfont, 1998)
Wednesday

Test Pattern Presents
Linda Linda Linda (Nobuhiro Yamashita, 2005)
Monday

VHS Fleapit
The Nailgun Massacre (Terry Lofton, Bill Leslie, 1985)
Tuesday

British Film Festival | selected highlights
Billy Elliot (Stephen Daldry, 2000)
Thursday, Saturday & Monday

The History of Sound (Oliver Hermanus, 2025)
Friday, Saturday & Sunday

Urchin (Harris Dickinson, 2025)
Saturday & Monday

Anemone (Ronan Day-Lewis, 2025)
Friday, Saturday & Sunday

Hayden Orpheum | selected highlights
Nosferatu (F.W. Murnau, 1922)
Original Live Score performance
Friday

Edge of Life (Lynette Wallworth, 2025)
Saturday & Sunday

Prime Minister (Michelle Walshe, Lindsay Utz, 2025)
Saturday, Sunday & Tuesday

2001: A Space Odyssey + 2010: The Year We Made Contact
Sunday

Songs Inside (Shalom Almond, 2025)
w/ Q+A
Monday

Golden Age Cinema | selected highlights
Put Your Soul On Your Hand And Walk (Sepideh Farsi, 2025)
Friday, Saturday & Monday

Certain Women (Kelly Reichardt, 2016)
Sunday

High Art (Lisa Cholodenko, 1998)
Wednesday

Ritz Cinemas, Randwick | selected highlights
Put Your Soul On Your Hand And Walk (Sepideh Farsi, 2025)
Daily

Yurlu | Country (Yaara Bou Melhem, 2025)
Thursday, Monday, Tuesday & Wednesday

Train Dreams (Clint Bentley, 2025)
Daily (except Sunday & Monday)

If I Had Legs I'd Kick You (Mary Bronstein, 2025)
Daily

Prime Minister (Michelle Walshe, Lindsay Utz, 2025)
Daily

Edge of Life (Lynette Wallworth, 2025)
Daily (except Saturday & Sunday)

Jim Jarmusch Less Is More (link)
Broken Flowers (2005)
Thursday

Cult Classics (link)
Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: The Movie (Bryan Spicer, 1995)
Saturday & Monday

Celluloid Film (link)
Kill Bill Vol. 1 & 2 (Quentin Tarantino)
Friday

Classic Matinees (link)
The Wild One (László Benedek, 1953)
Saturday & Monday

Make It Musical (link)
West Side Story (Jerome Robbins, Robert Wise, 1961)
Sunday & Wednesday

Meet Cute (link)
Say Anything... (Cameron Crowe, 1989)
Tuesday

Dendy Newtown | selected highlights
Put Your Soul On Your Hand And Walk (Sepideh Farsi, 2025)
Daily

Fwends (Sophie Somerville, 2025)
Friday

If I Had Legs I'd Kick You (Mary Bronstein, 2025)
Daily

Edge of Life (Lynette Wallworth, 2025)
Daily

Songs Inside (Shalom Almond, 2025)
w/ Q+A
Sunday

Cells Out (link)
Reservoir Dogs (Quentin Tarantino, 1992)
Thursday

Palace Cinemas | selected highlights
Put Your Soul On Your Hand And Walk (Sepideh Farsi, 2025)
Daily (except Thursday)

Train Dreams (Clint Bentley, 2025)
Tuesday

If I Had Legs I'd Kick You (Mary Bronstein, 2025)
Daily

Signorinella: Little Miss (Swan, McFadyen, Pricolo, 2025)
Daily

Cult Vault (link)
The Lost Boys (Joel Schumacher, 1987)
Monday

Matinee Memories (link)
Charade! (Stanley Donen, 1963)
Saturday

Art Gallery of NSW
Japanese Film Festival 2025
Silent film and live music: Japanese paper films
Sunday

Woman of the Mist (Heinosuke Gosho, 1936)
Wednesday