IN EARLY DECEMBER, the Israeli production company Yes Studios released a new film, #NOVA, which documents how the October 7th attacks unfolded for attendees of the Supernova trance music festival. The documentary, which is available on YouTube in Israel but has not yet been widely released, is composed almost entirely of mobile phone videos, recordings, and text messages from festivalgoers. It begins with an audio clip of one survivor calling her father as she tries to run away from the shooting. He tells her to hang up the phone and play dead. The next sequence is composed of video fragments from the hours leading up to the Hamas attack: Partygoers snap on their wristbands, show off their outfits in the mirror, sway to the thumping beat of the DJ set. In the dark, a girl waves a flag reading, “Universo Parallelo,” parallel universe, the rave’s tag line. The crowd is shown jumping in sync, neon lights flashing over their faces, a pair of digitized technicolor skulls nodding and shimmering overhead. The film then captures the moment, in the early hours of October 7th, when the music stops. A security guard comes up to the DJ and tells him to stop playing, that the party is over, red alert, and orders the crowd to disperse. One young man, still high from the rave, almost seems to be dancing to the beat of the explosions as they echo overhead, laughing as he chants: “bam bam, bam bam bam!” As the rockets continue, a woman tells herself, “You’re screwed—who throws a party in Gaza?”…..more
