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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
World
Saeed Kamali Dehghan

‘I refuse to simplify Syria for western audiences’: director Soudade Kaadan on making a war movie without bloodshed

 Saudade Kaadan.
Director Saudade Kaadan, whose award-winning film, Nezouh, about her conflict-ravaged home city of Damascus, is about to go on general release. Photograph: Joke Schut

When Soudade Kaadan embarked on the journey to make a film about her war-torn home city of Damascus, she was burdened by “certain expectations as to how a Syrian film should look”.

“They want us to simplify the complexity of the Syrian war for western audiences,” she says. “I refuse to do that. They want films from Syria to be explanatory and informative and not a film with storytelling, with a personal point of view.

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