''Silvered Water, Syria Self-Portrait'' ( ar, ماء الفضة, french: Eau argentée, Syrie autoportrait) is a Syrian

documentary film A documentary film or documentary is a non-fictional motion-picture intended to "document reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction, education or maintaining a historical record". Bill Nichols has characterized the documentary in te ...

about the Syrian Civil War, directed by

Ossama Mohammed Ossama Mohammed ( ar, أسامة محمد; born 21 March 1954) is a Syrian film director and screenwriter. His film, ''The Box of Life'', was screened in the Un Certain Regard section at the 2002 Cannes Film Festival. He is currently living in ...

and

Wiam Simav Bedirxan Wiam Simav Bedirxan is a Syrian Kurdish documentary filmmaker from Homs, who co-directed the 2014 film '' Silvered Water, Syria Self-Portrait'' with exiled filmmaker Usama Muhammad. Bedirxan documented the Siege of Homs and sent its footage via th ...

. The film premiered in the Special Screenings section of the 2014 Cannes Film Festival. Shot by a reported “1,001 Syrians,” according to the filmmakers, ''Silvered Water, Syria Self-Portrait'' impressionistically documents the destruction and atrocities of the civil war through a combination of eye-witness accounts shot on mobile phones and posted to the internet, and footage shot by Bedirxan during the

siege of Homs The siege of Homs was a military confrontation between the Syrian military and the Syrian opposition in the city of Homs, a major rebel stronghold during the Syrian Civil War. The siege lasted three years from May 2011 to May 2014, and result ...

. Bedirxan, an elementary school teacher in Homs, had contacted Mohammed online to ask him what he would film, if he was there. Mohammed, working in forced exile in Paris, is tormented by feelings of cowardice as he witnesses the horrors from afar, and the self-reflexive film also chronicles how he is haunted in this dreams by a Syrian boy once shot to death for snatching his camera on the street. The documentary includes some scenes of atrocities that Mohammed believes could only have been filmed by members of the Syrian government security forces. Mohammed and Bedirxan only met in person for the first time when she was able to escape Homs and attend the world premiere in France.

References

External links

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Cannes Film Festival webpage
2014 films 2014 documentary films Syrian documentary films 2010s Arabic-language films Documentary films about the Syrian civil war Documentary films about citizen media Self-reflexive films Documentary films alleging war crimes Films directed by Ossama Mohammed Documentary films about the Internet Homs {{Syria-stub