Inside Hana's Suitcase

A movie from Japan to Canada with the world in between, expressed in many languages, developing a vivid series of WWII events, a simple and most understanding document, easily flowing from end to beginning and back again, a slow unfolding of an amazing period of time and great distances yet holding together, a modern miracle. - Ron

***

Definitely not a tear jerker, rather a unique film filled with love & respect for courageous children lost in war and contemporary children telling this story of one child, Hana from Moravia.

`Love never dies` is given new meaning in Larry Weinstein`s profound documentary, Inside Hana`s Suitcase`, as Hana`s dream of becoming a teacher is fulfilled through Japanese teacher Fumiko Ishioka, her students, a Japanese survior of the atomic bomb, Hana`s schoolmates & friends , her adoring brother - George Brady and his family and young students in Canada.

Alexina Louie & Alex Pauk`s musical score enhances the childrens voices; gifted cinematographer,Horst Zeidler recreates Hana`s journey from a happy Moravian childhood, to Auschwitz in 1944. Ironically, Auschwitz, where young Hana`s suitcase is confiscated, serves as the nucleus that breaks the silence. Karen`s Levine`s book tells the story but this film enables to fulfill Hana's dream: to teach children to never lose hope.Hana`s brother, George Brady, Fumiko Ishioka and Laura Brady are sooooo splendid! - Katherine

***

The film is a moving tribute to the resiliency of the human spirit, the power of love, and the belief in the possibility of a better, more humane world....well worth seeing. The effortless flow between past and present was akin to a well-choreographed dance, brilliantly executed.

The story - a suitcase left behind by a child, lost in the holocaust - took a good deal of creative ingenuity. One Japanese woman showed each and every one of us could make a difference, one by one, in making this a more hospitable planet. I hope this film gets to be seen by children in every schoolroom in every country around the word. They are our future. And if the children in this film are representative of how the film will be received, the future looks much brighter than the past. - Rita