By 
By Roger Costa
FOR SAMA
Looking around the devastation and hopelessness around her, a young journalist apologizes to her baby daughter for bringing her into this chaotic world. Directed by Edward Watts and Waad Al-Khateab, the film is completely filmed by Al-Khateab, a constant and important eye-witness of the horrors of war. Documenting the early days of the Revolution in Aleppo, the clash between civilians and soldiers, the process of gathering forces to battle the regime, and the Russian invasion, co-director Al-Khateab brings the audience into a personal, deeply moving and striking journey in search of freedom.
She walks through the city, collecting heartbreaking testimonies of people losing their families and houses, living under the fear of getting bombed at any time, as the streets burst into flames destroying their hope. Poetically narrated by herself, as a love-letter to her daughter, (and perhaps a testament), she captures alarming and shocking moments of innocent people being attacked, especially children and young women, with real-time images sometimes very difficult to watch.
Building a sumptuous feminine perspective on the war subject, she goes back and forth in time to introduce how Sama came to life: her early days as a student, the beginning of the love affair with the doctor, her wedding, the transformations in the city and political regime, and finally Sama’s arrival, which coincides with the peek of the battle. As the world starts to pay attention and to intervene, her husband, who is running the only Hospital remaining, becomes the center of the negotiations for surrendering and for their humiliating, yet triumphant departure.
An award-winning journalist who raised awareness for her people’s struggle with her videos and stories, Al-Khateab created one of the most important and courageous modern-war depiction ever made. Spanning five years in the conflicts, the film presents detailed facts of the massacre, exposing the tragedy of hundreds of corpses, but mostly she seeks for determination and compassion among them, documenting their struggles and efforts to maintain a Hospital functioning, their loyalty to one another, their children and strong bond.
Winner of the Golden Eye Award at this year’s Cannes, and named Best Documentary at SXSW, Telluride and Hot Docs Canadian Film Festivals, it’s a gripping, inclusive and shocking look at the bloodshed reality of war, and a saddened mirror to society’s negligence and hardened hearts.
(Frontline/PBS. 7/26. Quad Cinemas NYC.)
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