Love Hate Love

Tribeca Film Festival co-founder Jane Rosenthal, said during her introduction to the world premiere of Love Hate Love at the 2011 edition: "The film is all about 9/12." Sean Penn, the executive producer showed up to do the red carpet in support of the filmmakers, Dana Nachman and Don Hardy. Three separate acts of terrorism: the attacks on the World Trade Center, the 7/7 London bus atrocity and the Sari Club bombing in Bali are the starting off point for the decision to make a film where three families who suffered losses turn their tragedies into humanitarian work.

Esther Hyman lost her sister Miriam, who was riding on a bus on the day of the London attacks in order to escape the Underground bombings. The bus she chose to get on 45 minutes later blew up. Miriam's family turned their grief into a gift for thousands of children by using the compensation award to them for their loss to sponsor children's eye care in rural India.

Australian Ben Tullipan, who lost both of his legs in the Sari Club bombing on October 12, 2002, attended the Tribeca screening and believes his life was spared for a reason. He counsels one-on-one with other amputees and has since married. Ben says his daughter is proud of him too: "My daddy's half robot."

Also appearing at the screening were the parents of Peter, who lost his life on 9/11 when he arrived early for a Bloomberg Media conference on the 106th floor in Tower 1 of the World Trade Center. Liz and Steve Alderman have set off on a mission to develop mental health care clinics in war-torn countries all around the world, including Cambodia, Rwanda, Liberia, Sudan, Uganda and Haiti. Steve and Liz, married for 45 years, have spent significant time away from their past quiet suburban life to maintain the clinics and build new ones. When they were awarded $1.4 million, she called the compensation "blood money".

The Aldermans did not want a playground or a university chair funded by them and named after Peter. "If we could help people who survived horrific events and bring them to normal functioning, that would be the perfect memorial for our son."

All three families documented in this film are hands-on and very much involved in doing good without doing harm. We see lives altered forever and as Sean Penn said at the screening "transcending the barrage of pessimism". I followed up on what Sean said and asked the filmmakers if it had been clear to them from the beginning that they wanted to connect three stories transcending pessimism. Dana responded that they started out with all 9/11 and their research since 2006 convinced them to cast a wider global net.