Florida Premiere / USA / 2025 / English / 98 min / Drama / Florida Premiere
Director, Writer: Ziad H Hamzeh; Producers: Christine Handy, Michael Espinosa;
Key Cast: Tricia Helfer, Tarek Bishara, Sadie Stratton, Lisa Marcos. Contact: hamzeh.ziadh@gmail.com
SYNOPSIS – Willow (Tricia Helfer) has everything the world could envy — a glittering career as a supermodel, a stunning home, a husband who adores her, Khalil (Tarek Bishara), and two bright, beautiful children, Isabel (Sara Boustany) and Alex (Liam Anderson). To outsiders, her life is picture-perfect.
But behind the perfect smile lies a woman walking a tightrope.
Her teenage daughter is spiraling. Her husband is pulled in every direction. And her mother-in-law, Mariam (Susan Shalhoub Larkin), is an unrelenting force of tradition and opinion.
Then — everything changes. A diagnosis no woman wants to hear: breast cancer. The news shatters her world. Her body begins to change. Her strength begins to fade. The mirror no longer reflects the woman the world once knew.
But this is not a story about loss — it’s a story about rediscovery and resilience.
In the fight for her life, Willow finds a deeper kind of beauty — one forged in love, in pain, and in quiet acts of courage. She forms an unlikely bond with another woman facing the same battle. She opens her heart to a young girl with no one to turn to. And with the surprising support of Mariam, she rebuilds bridges once thought burned.
And on the day of her final treatment, something extraordinary happens. A crowd gathers, each person holding a pink umbrella — not in mourning, but in celebration. A spontaneous parade of hope and healing. A tribute to the woman who learned to shine, not in spite of the storm, but because of it.
Based on the true story of Christine Handy and her bestselling novel, Walk Beside Me, Hello Beautiful is a moving portrait of transformation, a journey through illness into strength, and a reminder that sometimes, the most radiant beauty comes from within.
SPEICAL GUESTS: Christine Handy & Ziad H Hamzeh
SPONSORED BY: Carl Berkrlhammer
Director Biography – Ziad H Hamzeh
Ziad’s body of work as a director, producer and writer has earned over fifty awards and honors. Most recently, Ziad won the Golden Palm award for Best Film at the Beverly Hills Film festival for his film Hello Beautiful. Ziad produced the Tunisian hit film Take My Breath. The film has been selected to represent Tunisia at 2025, 97th Oscars for best international film. This year, Ziad wrote, produced, and directed Hello Beautiful based on the best-selling book Walk Beside Me by Christine Handy.
Earlier in 2023, Ziad produced the Rwandan film Upstanding and the critically acclaimed The Island of Forgiveness with Claudia Cardinale. He Executive produced the Iranian film Forbidden Womanhood. Prior work includes producing The Flower of Aleppo starring Hend Sabry and executive produced Dreams I Never Had starring Malcolm McDowell and Robin Givens. The Flower of Aleppo was honored as Tunisia’s entry into both the 2017 Academy Awards and the Golden Globe Awards. Irrefutable Proof, a dramatic thriller Ziad directed and produced, swept the Beverly Hills Film Festival earning three of the fest’s highest awards: the Golden Palm, Best Actress, and Best Cinematography. He received the Abu Dhabi Film Festival’s Black Pearl Award for Best Producer for the film Always Brando, which had its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival. Always Brando also received the Best Picture Award from the Alexandria Film Festival and the Jury Prize from the Algerian Film Festival. Ziad’s documentary The Letter: An American Town and the Somali Invasion premiered at AFI film festival and was chosen as the opening film Amnesty International film festival. The Letter won numerous awards and accolades and was heralded as Critics Pick by New York Magazine. Woman, a documentary Ziad shot on location in Syria, once again earned Ziad the Beverly Hills Film Festival’s highest honor, the Golden Palm Award. ¡Henry O! garnered Best Documentary honors at the BHFF as well as the Best of Fest Award from the Breckenridge Film Festival and the Accolades Award for Excellence in Film.
His critically acclaimed feature film Shadow Glories has been heralded as “Powerful and distinctive. A mature, accomplished work…strong, stylish and uncompromising” by Kevin Thomas, film critic for The Los Angeles Times. Ziad is a member of the Producer’s Guild of America serving on the diversity committee.
Director Statement
The book Walk Beside Me by Christine Handy entered my life years ago with a single suggestion: Turn this story into a screenplay. From the first page, I was pulled into Christine’s diary-like account—a raw, unflinching chronicle of her battle to survive. Her words were not just read; they were felt in every fiber of my being. Here was a woman who had built her identity on beauty, a supermodel at the height of her career, suddenly confronted with breast cancer—a disease that threatened not just her body, but her very sense of self.
I found myself haunted by questions: How does a person who feels she has lost everything think and feel? Where does she find the will to keep going? Can someone so near death rise from the ashes like a phoenix? Christine’s determination—and her humanity—pulled me into her world and refused to let go.
For five years, I poured myself into this project. I wrote, revised, and rewrote, determined to honor her lived experience. We spoke nearly every day. I researched relentlessly. I listened, not just to her words, but to the silence between them—the weight of her fears, her courage, and her remarkable resilience. Slowly, a central truth revealed itself: this was not just a story about illness, but about transformation, connection, and the unbreakable human spirit.
Bringing this story to the screen required embracing every perspective it touched. Cancer is never faced alone—it ripples through parents, children, spouses, and friends. The trauma, the hope, the grief, and the love are shared. To tell the true story, I had to honor them all, while never losing sight of Willow’s journey at the heart of it.
Our cast and crew understood this vision. They embraced it fully. What began as a labor of love became a testament to resilience—a story that belongs to anyone who has ever loved, lost, or fought to rise again.