French pay-TV channel Canal+ will host a Cinema for Peace broadcast event in prime time on Tuesday night (February 17), starting with director Loris Lai’s “Children of Gaza: How Kids Role” (“How Kids Role”), followed by a live discussion between the film’s two leads.
Set in 2003, the drama follows two 11-year-old boys, Mahmoud, a Palestinian, and Aron, an Israeli, living in Gaza, whose shared passion for surfing helps them survive the violence around them. Set during the Second Intifada, the film follows two children who bond under the guidance of their mentor, Dan, a 30-year-old former surfing champion. As tensions rise, Mahmoud is forced to make a potentially life-changing choice. The film was made before Hamas attacked Israel on October 7, 2024, and before the Gaza war broke out.
The film, written by Rai and Daria Heyman, is liberally inspired by Nicoletta Bortolotti’s children’s novel Sulle Onde Della Libertà, published by Ragazzi Mondadori.
Hailed by Canal+ as a “universal message of peace,” “How Kids Roll” was originally titled “I Bambini di Gaza” and was produced by Eagle Pictures’ Tarak Ben Ammar, who produced “The Boy in Pink Pants,” which set a box office record in Italy in 2024, and Elda Ferri, whose credits include Roberto Benigni’s Oscar-winning “Life is Beautiful.” The original music was composed by Academy Award winner Nicola Piovani, composer of the film Life is Beautiful.
“Children are a new generation and they are the only real hope for a different future, a better future… peace. We must believe in it, even if it is just a dream,” Rai said. “Ennio Flaiano once said: ‘Those who refuse to dream are forced to endure reality.’ We cannot endure this reality, we must dream, we must believe,” he added.
The film won the Best Director award at the 2025 David di Donatello Awards, Italy’s highest film honor. It won Best International Film at the Beverly Hills Film Festival and was selected at the Santa Barbara International Film Festival.
A post-broadcast discussion on Canal+, moderated by well-known TV hosts Sonia Mabrouk and Laurie Korewa, will reunite Rai with the film’s young stars Michael Friedel and Marwan Hamdan, Les Eclats de la Paix vice president Hugues Devavrin, and directors Alexandre Arkady, Pascal Hervé and Javad Lalib. The discussion will explore the film’s origins, the theme of fraternity, and the broader question of how film can build bridges.
The initiative follows a live screening of the film hosted by Canal+ at the MacMahon Theater in Paris, where middle school students had a Q&A with the director and cast, highlighting the film’s resonance with young audiences.
