City of Ghosts

There are many that feel that this generation's access to data has in some way watered down the power of media. In a world where everything is RIGHT NOW, traditional media like print is dying on the vine. While this may be true of things like newspapers and magazines, the media is finally becoming more savvy and not only embracing a digital age that they found to be beneath them and more "bush league," they are also finding that this new age gives more opportunity to get to stories that they could not because of things like notoriety and old school methods. In "Cartel Land" director Matthew Heineman's new film "City of Ghosts," this subject is given a very up close and personal examination in a setting that is jarring, frightening, and heartbreaking.

In the city of Raqqa in Iraq just a few years ago, the Assad regime fell to its rebellion, and the people who lived there felt like a new age was upon them. Unfortunately, that new age came in the form of ISIS, whose strong arm tactics and extremist beliefs caused oppression, violence, and murder within its city walls. A group of oppositionists both in and out of the city began a group called Raqqa is Being Slaughtered Silently (RBSS), and used the power of social media and the Internet to take the story of their city public. This would resort in their plight being broadcast worldwide through large media outlets, but the cost would be steep for them by way of exile, assassinations, and being constantly on the run from an organization that wants each and every one of them dead, even to the point of facing ridicule from the countries that they run to as it pertains not to just them but any kind of immigration from other countries, showing the effects of some of the same issues that we currently face in ours.

As I was watching "City of Ghosts," there was only one word that kept running through my mind, and that word is simply: powerful. Heineman pulls no punches with this film, showing the pain and suffering of the people in Raqqa and how it effects the leaders of RBSS. The balance that his subjects display of both the immense courage it takes to lead a movement like this as well as the human sides of themselves dealing with loss of family, friends, and even their freedom on a certain level is nothing short of brilliant. I was glued to the screen the entire time and while there are no twists or turns per se, this story kept me guessing all the way through as ISIS tries at every turn to suppress their message from destroying all satellite dishes in an effort to shut down their internet access in the city to threatening (and even killing in some cases) those close to them. There is also a very interesting look at ISIS and how they use their own methods of communication to bring people into their ranks that is honest (and I know this sounds odd, but roll with me here) unbiased. What I mean there is that the filmmakers simply show the actual footage that the group has published without doctoring it up, and trust me when I say this: it totally speaks for itself.

I was consistently fascinated by the resilience of RBSS' people inside the city to get the footage that they did to show the world the pain and suffering that those who stand against their oppressors go through, to the point of long lines of children who are just trying to get a bucket filled with soup to feed them and their families. I cannot imagine the constant fear that they have to overcome to tell their stories by putting their lives in danger every day. "City of Ghosts" is one of those films that although it will get a limited run due to the fact that documentaries don't tend to get the widespread theatrical love that they deserve in most cases, it demands the attention and respect that it deserves. Whether caught theatrically, via Blu-Ray or DVD, or through streaming, this is a film that is worth the time to watch and be discussed on any scale if for no other reason than the awareness that it needs to foster of not only the dangers of extremism but also the courage it takes to stand for what you believe in and the message that every group of people, no matter how you look at it, has a dark side and a light side, and we all need to see that for what it is. Celebrate the good, rebuke the bad, and try to get through all of it as one group of people embracing our diversity and doing our best to understand our differences.

This documentary is based around the media group RBSS and as such whilst a fascinating account of a group of proud and brave individuals it doesn't have the scope to be truly great filmmaking. Some of the footage is truly shocking and for those that want to reject immigrants, political asylum seekers they really need to watch this film. They obviously won't though and you can't help feel this is preaching to the converted. My heart goes out to these guys and their beloved city though....

Very trajic. Empowering people. A heartfelt film. Shows the power of human connection and what we can accomplish.

Having won a national award for journalism, I was feeling really pumped about me until I saw the journalists in City of Ghosts. Here are heroes who leave me breathless in awe of their courage fighting Isis in its home, Raqqa. A formerly docile town, it changed with the emergence of ISIS tanks in 2014 after the remarkable Arab Spring of 2012.

The citizen journalists, RBSS (Raqqa is Being Slaughtered Silently), begin fighting in earnest when they realize ISIS has taken control because of the vacuum of power after that Spring. This doc is almost exclusively a chronicle of their struggle to remain viable after ISIS zeroed in on them and began torturing and beheading relatives and friends.

So the heroism is much more personal than fighting ISIS; it is about good people combating an implacable foe at the expense of their families and themselves. When the doc shows a fighter watching a video of his father being assassinated and when at the end of the film a fighter shakes in guilt and fear over having survived and his friends didn't because he escaped from Raqqa, the audience is witnessing a reality show like no other our poor commercial fluff gives us in that name.

The depressing element of this is how successful ISIS has been because of the Hollywood production type elements in these gruesome and seductive promos. Assassinations are edited with the expertise of your garden-variety super-hero blockbuster.

City of Ghosts features fighters who are ghosts of their former happy lives, but they are heroes the likes of which we have long forgotten.

Shows the extent evil will go to. Emotional and empowering seeing the human connection.