War has always been hell, but we haven’t always had cell phone cameras to capture it. Silvered Water, Syria Self Portrait documents the Syrian civil war in a way that war has never before been seen. Expressionistically edited from video postings on social media, the film achieves an immediacy that is powerful, shocking, and surprising. Organized into chapters, “1,001 Syrians” bear unblinking witness to the horrors, the senseless destruction, and chaos, but who would expect images of so many maimed and hobbled cats, or “freedom” written in blood on virgin snow? Exiled Syrian filmmaker Ossama Mohammed compiles his found-footage Guernica from Paris, and advises young Kurdish filmmaker Wiam Simav Bedirxan, who volunteers to act as his eyes in Syria, all the while commenting on his own sense of despair and helplessness, and hoping against hope that film can still make a difference.
