Gaza Sunbirds

Original Title: Gaza Sunbirds

Runtime: 90'

Expected Release: May 2027

Production Stage: Post-Production

1st Feature: Yes

Looking for: Co-Producers, Broadcasters, Sales Agents, Distributors

Synopsis:

When a young amputee cyclist and his underdog team of bike racers chase their dream of representing Palestine on the world stage, their six-year odyssey becomes a matter of life or death adaptation as bombs descend on Gaza.

Director’s Profile:

Flavia Cappellini is a self-shooting director who also works as a correspondent for Sky News Italia in Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories. Her work as a filmmaker has appeared on The Guardian, Al Jazeera English, Sky News Italia and RAI. Her stories explore unexpected aspects of our world by picking out the human experiences and everyday quirks that give meaning to complexity without over-simplification. This multi-year project is her first feature film, and it relates sport to conflict, politics and geographical boundaries. She has also investigated abortion, burials and women’s reproductive rights in Italy through original testimonies and unearthed records. Her career in filmmaking started as a producer of films about travel and the environment for RAI, later producing and shooting in-depth features about professional road cycling racing around the world for 3 years.

Producer’s Profile:

Kristian Van der Heyden began Harald House Belgium in 2016 after honing his skills in Los Angeles as a writer, producer, and actor for eight years. He produced A Punk Daydream (2019), a documentary that delves into the street punk culture of Indonesia, which premiered at Rotterdam Film Festival in 2019. Kristian produced Slave Island, a co-production with Belgium, Estonia, Taiwan, and Italy, about present-day slavery on a remote island of Indonesia, which premiered at Movies That Matter 2025 and won Best Belgian Documentary at Docville 2025. His projects typically explore significant social challenges within various communities, across cultures. Appreciative of the learning experiences each project brings, Kristian’s dedication to impactful storytelling was acknowledged in 2022 when he was named an Emerging Producer at the Ji-Hlava Film Festival.