In the documentary “We Will Dance Again,” the directors depict the Hamas led assault on Israel on October 7 through the eyes of the Nova attendees. As per Israeli officials, at least 360 attendees died at a party near the Gaza border. This film, directed by Yariv Mizer, starts with a certain problematic statement. “The Hamas massacre in Israel and the subsequent war in Gaza destroyed human life on both sides,” Says the text. It claims that, “The war has claimed lives on both parties”. Some perspectives do not exist, or worse, some voices have been silenced. This condition, however, is in filming from the particular region.
At the same time, that disclaimer gives an insight into what makes evaluating We Will Dance Again as a film such a complex exercise. People who feel strongly about such controversial matters are welcomed to have thoughts and feelings about them, there is no shame in it, however to release a film, especially one that comes out 3 days before the anniversary of the attack, that is already occurring during a war, without the awareness of the region’s politics enveloping the film is farcical.
Using cell phone footage, interviews with attendees, and later clips from Hamas rebels, the documentary “We Will Dance Again” reconstructs how the attack unfolded at the music event at which multiday based festivals where the concerts were the main highlight. Many said they have seen missiles being launched during sunrise on the 7th of October. “Wow Lali, it is like it is new year and there are fireworks!” one interviewee, Lile Chetrit or ‘Lali’, recalls a friend as saying. “Lali, I love how you guys invited your tongues to the show.” An unnamed voice is heard saying as he was staring at the lines in the skies.
But the interviewers tell us how they came to the knowledge of what was unfolding. As the storyline of the documentary progresses, we find interested people such as Noa Beer who had to drive away from the site and called a police officer whom she stated did not know what was going on. Elinor Gambari an, a lone mother, remained in the confines of a refrigerator.
As the interviewees Eitan Halley and Ziv Abud explain, there was a frag grenade attack on the roadside shelter they were at. They appreciate Aner Shapira’s attempts to toss back grenades before they detonated even though he was killed. Halley claims that he glimpsed Hersh Goldberg Polina, who was captured by Hamas, and whose body would later be found, not long after the explosion.
Although the sequential editing of such vastly different materials is certainly worthy of submission, some of Mizer’s stylistic decisions can be regarded as gratuitous embellishments of the introduced witnesses. (Nabeel Chetrit’s quite obscene account of trying to identify the source of gunfire by locating the birds being fired at begs the need for the electronically charged soundtrack more than once.) “We Will Dance Again” is intended to focus attention on it one year after the assassination. If violence and brutality were the dominating feelings of that day, time seems to serve to provide space for distance, which ‘We Will Dance Again’ seeks to bridge toward viewers.
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