"It Is Not Just War. It Is Life": Acclaimed Doc "For Sama" Offers Rare Glimpse into War-Torn Syria
We look at the award-winning documentary feature titled "For Sama," a devastating account of war-torn Syria told through the eyes of director Waad al-Kateab. She filmed hundreds of hours of footage in her native Aleppo to create a stunning depiction of life during wartime. Amid airstrikes and attacks on hospitals, Waad falls in love with one of the last remaining doctors in Aleppo, gets married and has a baby girl, Sama, to whom the film is dedicated. When protests against the regime of President Bashar al-Assad first began in 2011, Waad al-Kateab was a young economics student who began filming on a cellphone. For five years, she documented her own life and the lives of those around her as the Assad regime intensified its brutal response to the uprising. She eventually gathered hundreds of hours of footage. Ahead of the film's release in the U.S. next Thursday, we speak with Waad al-Kateab and her husband Hamza al-Kateab, a doctor and the co-founder and former director of the Al Quds Hospital in Aleppo.