AIDA RETURNS

This film tells a story that is sometimes touching, sometimes sad, and sometimes painful. It is also funny and tearful in its absurdity that accompanies a double journey: a journey of loss, where “Aida” (the director’s mother) struggles with Alzheimer’s disease, fighting the loss of memory and self, and finding solace in her repeated “return” to Jaffa and Palestine in the days of her youth; And the final return trip to Jaffa and Palestine, where Aida will finally rest and regain her being.

The film accompanies Carol (the director) as she searches for a way to return her mother to Jaffa in search of her eternal rest. The film is a tribute to the lost past of the director’s family, an attempt to recover a piece of individual and collective memory, and a poetic gesture and affirmation to all those exiled Palestinians who are prevented from returning to their homeland, even after death.

Both journeys are at once deeply personal, resonating with hundreds of thousands of Alzheimer's patients and their families as well as with hundreds of thousands of Palestinian refugees waiting to return home.