Return to Homs
Description
Filmed between 2011 and 2013, this urgent dispatch from the besieged Syrian city of Homs—“capital of the revolution” against the Assad regime—transmits a visceral eyewitness account of a peaceful uprising descending into civil war. Director Talal Derki focuses on two youths coming of age as revolutionaries: Basset, a teen soccer star turned charismatic singer and rebel fighter, and Ossama, a media activist. Their ideals quickly come up against the reality that neither Ossama’s cameras nor Basset’s guns are adequate weapons against Assad’s army. As the siege tightens, the film stays within the narrowing horizons of the rebels, who talk more fervently of martyrdom the more they perceive that the world has forsaken them. Derki refuses the pretense of journalistic objectivity, sharing in his subjects’ grief and outrage and taking grave risks to document their struggle. He said in an interview: “I felt death could be close, but I had a feeling that my moment is not here yet, so I followed my camera to tell the story of the people of Homs, how they dream and despair, and how they are bidding farewell to each other.” Part elegy, part call to action, the film won the World Cinema Grand Jury Prize for Documentary at Sundance. –Juliet Clark
Talal Derki was born in Damascus in 1977 and studied filmmaking in Greece. Two previous works that he made under a pseudonym during the Syrian uprising have won prizes at international film festivals: Azadi earned the Silver Hawk at the Architecture Film Festival Rotterdam in 2011, and Lajat received a Special Mention at the Arab Camera Festival in 2012. Derki has also worked as a video journalist for Thompson Reuters, CNN, ITV, Al Arabiya and France 24.
Trailer
//player.vimeo.com/video/88915318?autoplay=1Film Details
Language Arabic
Year 2013
Runtime 87
Country Syria/Germany
Director Talal Derki
Producer Orwa Nyrabia, Hans Robert Eisenhauer
Editor Anne Fabini, Martin Reimers
Cinematographer Kahtan Hassoun, Ossama al Homsi, Talal Derki, Orwa Nyrabia
Music Katarina Holmberg
Print Source Proaction Film/ orwa@proactionfilm.com