The Venice Film Festival saw a record-setting 23-minute standing ovation with the Gaza drama The Voice of Hind Rajab as the audience broke into chants of “Free Palestine.”

According to Deadline , the movie directed by Kaouther Ben Hania reconstructs “the events surrounding the killing of 6-year-old Hind Rajab, her four cousins, her aunt and uncle, and the two paramedics who came to her rescue after their car came under fire by Israeli forces as they tried to flee Gaza City in January 2024.”

Here in Venice, it’s thought that Pedro Almodóvar’s English-language debut, last year’s The Room Next Door , had been the ovation record-holder at 18 minutes. The longest recorded applause at a film festival had been a 22-minute standing ovation for Guillermo del Toro’s 2006 film Pan’s L

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