A perfect antidote to tension and despair is Linda Hattendorf’s remarkable documentary, The Cats of Mirikitani. She is a New York filmmaker who befriended Jimmy Mirikitani, a Japanese-American octogenarian artist who lived on the streets in her neighbourhood, early in 2001; later she invited him to stay with her to escape the toxic dust of 9/11. Hattendorf’s film documents these months, during which she gradually learns Mirikitani’s story: he was born in California, educated in Japan, trained as an artist, interned during World War II, forced to renounce his U.S. citizenship, brokered out as a labourer and left with almost no family after the bombing of Hiroshima. Mirikitani has never really recovered from these events and has refused any help from the government that betrayed him. By chance Hattendorf locates a relative and eventually helps to reunite Mirikitani with a sister he thought he’d never see again; she also takes his powerful art to an appreciative audience.