The documentary takes place primarily in two cities - Chicago, USA and Damascus, Syria. Nineteen-year-old, Ala'a Basatneh is the focus of the film along with her friends Omar, Bassel and Aous. From the comfort of her home in Chicago, Ala'a communicates with the boys and with several other revolutionaries on the ground in Syria over social networks. Having moved from Syria to the states in an attempt to avoid Bashar al-Assad's dictatorship, Ala'a works close to 24/7 to help those still trapped in the harshly governed country. The film highlights the development of the revolution and how it was heavily influenced by similar protests in Egypt and Tunisia. Both of these protests successfully de-reigned their dictators in less than 30 days, however, the Syrian conflict continues to this day with the death toll rising.
Normally, documentaries like this do not appeal to me but I'm so grateful I saw it. To see the influence that a young girl can have and the impact of our actions online. It's an incredibly eye-opening experience to watch a girl, my age, change lives on Facebook when all I do is post photographs of drunken adventures and comparatively minimal achievements. Ala'a is a positive influence on everyone she talks to, helping to save lives from both Chicago and from the ground in Syria. As the film closed, the audience learnt that Ala'a had a successful first trip to Syria and was set to return a second time to provide medical supplies.
One aspect I found interesting was when Ala'a described what the police would ask the protesters when they got arrested. For their Facebook username and password. The government, obviously learning as they go, caught on to protesters using Facebook as their main form of communication and their way of organising events. Ala'a takes her friends account information before they attend a protest and once she hears that they have been captured she logs in and deactivates their account.The police use the information online to find other protesters and at one point they even found Ala'a. A few weeks after this, she was sent a death threat that explained that she would be made an example of. Clearly stressing the importance of deactivating the accounts once someone has been arrested.
A huge part of the documentary was the citizen journalists that documented the revolution with hidden cameras for the world to see. One of the Syrian government's ploys was to hide their actions from the rest of the world with the intentions of dealing with this problem 'in house'. Al-Assad has even appeared on American television blatantly lying about the state of the country and the horrific amounts of police brutality. So to counteract this, young, educated, men are filming the protests, and in some cases first hand accounts of government ordered killings, and uploading the content online. Basically a cry for help that the world wasn't hearing. The featured citizen journalist in this documentary was Bassel, obviously a representation of thousands of others just like him. He was educated in the USA before deciding to return to Syria to help in the fight against dictatorship.
Unfortunately, documentaries about such a conflict don't often end on a high. Both Omar and Bassel die during the course of this film with both funerals briefly shown. Their stories memorialised and used in an attempt to further highlight the problems within the country and the importance of support for the people on the ground who are only fighting for the freedom they deserve. The film contains graphic images of many injured men, women and children and shouldn't be taken lightly.
Something I never thought would capture my attention has fascinated me in a way I couldn't imagine. It makes me wonder about the way our world and our government bodies work and whether or not we are making the right steps forward towards a more peaceful world.
No comments:
Post a Comment