FOR SAMA

Director's Statement

WAAD AL-KATEAB
This is not just a film for me – it’s my life. I started capturing my personal story without any plan, just filming the protests in Syria on my mobile phone, like so many other activists. I could never have imagined where my journey would take me through those years. The mix of emotions we experienced - happiness, loss, love - and the horrific crimes committed by the Assad regime against ordinary innocent people, was unimaginable ... even as we lived through it.

From the beginning, I found myself drawn to capture stories of life and humanity, rather than focus on the death and destruction which filled the news. And as a woman in a conservative part of Aleppo, I was able to access the experiences of women and children in the city, traditionally off limits to men. That allowed me to show the unseen reality of life for ordinary Syrians, trying to live normal lives amid our struggle for freedom.

At the same time, I continued living my own life. I married and had a child. I found myself trying to balance so many different roles: Waad the mother, Waad the activist, Waad the citizen journalist and Waad the director. All those people both embodied and led the story. Now I feel those different aspects of my life are what gives the film its strength.

I want people to understand that, while this is my story and shows what happened to me and my family, our experience is not unusual. Hundreds of thousands of Syrians experienced the same thing and are still doing so today. The dictator who committed these crimes is still in power, still killing innocent people. Our struggle for justice is as relevant today as it was when the revolution first began.

I felt a great burden of responsibility to the city, its people and to our friends – to tell their stories properly so they will never be forgotten and no one can ever distort the truth of what we lived through.

Making the film was almost as hard as living through the years in Aleppo. I had to re-live everything again and again. Thankfully I worked with a great team who cared so much about me, my story, and Syria.

One person in particular is my fellow director, Edward Watts. He took the burden I carried onto his own shoulders and, with his strength added to my own, we were able to turn the vast complexity of my life and footage into the crafted story you see today.

EDWARD WATTS
This is the most important film I have ever worked on. I have been following the Syrian uprising since it began, trying to tell the truth beyond the lies and propaganda that have muddied people’s understanding of what happened in that country. That truth is embodied in the courage, honesty and altruism of Waad, Hamza and Sama. They are extraordinary people; an example to us all in these days of great tumult in the world.

In my documentaries I have always sought to highlight the humour and humanity we share with people living in desperate situations in the far flung corners of the world. That is the truth that will save us, not the false divisions so many people peddle these days. Our failure to stand with ordinary Syrians when they were protesting for their freedom and were brutally crushed by the Assad regime has led directly to so many of the problems that affect us all today, from the birth of ISIS to the rise of the far right, the refugee crisis and the normalisation of indiscriminate assaults against civilian populations in war.

Through Waad’s story, the world can finally see what really happened, understand the depth of our tragic mistakes and hopefully re-discover the steel in our bones to ensure it never happens again. It has been an honour and a privilege to direct this film with her.