Shortlisted for this year’s Best Feature Documentary Oscar, Director Brandon Kramer’s deeply empathetic story begins with the despicable attack that took place on the morning of October 7, 2023, while Israeli-American Liat Atzili and her husband Aviv were at home when Hamas attacked their kibbutz. By nightfall, Liat and Aviv are captives in Gaza along with 250 other people - 12 of whom, like Liat, are American citizens. Caught between international diplomacy and a rapidly escalating war, their family must face their own uncertainty and conflicting perspectives in the pursuit of Liat and Aviv's release. This agonizing process, and the ultimate fate of their loved ones, challenges how the members of the family understand themselves and their place in the conflict. Our guest, director Brandon Kramer, through the intimate lens of a family's experience, HOLDING LIAT poses complex questions of identity across generations, as the family is thrust into the epicenter of a global conflict rapidly unfolding in real-time.

About the filmmaker - Brandon Kramer is a Washington, DC-based filmmaker and co-founder of Meridian Hill Pictures with his brother Lance. Brandon directed THE FIRST STEP (Tribeca, AFI DOCS); CITY OF TREES (Full Frame Documentary Film Festival, PBS, Netflix); and the Webby Award-winning independent documentary series THE MESSY TRUTH (CNN). Brandon is a Film Independent Fellow, a DC Commission on the Arts & Humanities Fellow, a regular collaborator with Kartemquin Films in Chicago, and has served as a media teaching artist for the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. Brandon holds a bachelor's degree in film and cultural anthropology from Boston University.