Une famille syrienne

Most war movies are about soldiers and generals, trying to defeat the enemy. Not this one. 'Insyriated' is about what war does to the daily life of ordinary citizens. That can be even more gruesome to watch than scenes from a battlefield.

The film is set almost entirely in an apartment, where an extended family of nine tries to survive the war. The neighbourhood is constantly bombed, snipers are roaming the streets, there is no running water and no cell phone coverage. The front door of the apartment is barricaded. The rest of the building has been abandoned, left to looters and rapists.

In these circumstances, the family tries to live life as normal as possibly. During air raids, the teenage daughters listen to music on their smartphone, one earbud for each, as teenagers do. The grandfather quietly smokes his cigarettes and hugs his grandson. In the morning, family members quarrel about who can use the bathroom.

But the war is everywhere. There is no escape from it. The film shows how the lives of the family members are increasingly being dominated by fear, despair and anger. These human emotions are far more powerful to show the effects of war than even the most intense battlefield scene.

The decision to film everything within one apartment is a masterstroke. It creates a claustrophobic tension, and it helps the viewer to identify with the family members. Of course, this only works with a superb cast. The two powerful female leads stand out in particular. The mother, played by Arab-Israeli actress Hiam Abass, is great in hiding her true emotions and suppressing her fear to prevent unsettling her children. When she breaks down, at last, the impact is devastating. But the Lebanese actress Diamand Bou Abboud is no less impressive as the upstairs neighbour who has fled to the apartment with her baby, after her own apartment has been bombed.

One of the great things about the film is also that it doesn't spell out the war. In fact, nothing is being explained. We don't know who is fighting whom, or why. It doesn't matter. War is ugly anyhow. Apart from the title, there is even no indication that it takes place in Syria. It is a universal story.

Apart from being an emotional punch in the stomach, the film contains a lot of suspense. The script is very clever. Already in the first few minutes, a terrible incident creates a heart breaking dilemma for some family members. During the rest of the film, some other high-impact events make you sit on the edge of your chair.

'Insyriated' is definitively one of the best films I've seen this year. Maybe even the best. It would make a great candidate for the foreign language Oscars. What a pity that the producing countries, France and Belgium, have chosen other films. Neither one can even stand in the shadow of 'Insyriated'.

At first you might think this is a movie about war, but it isn't. It goes through the very struggles of everyday life, in an excruciating detail. It reminded me of "besieged" and of the "patient stone". Touching, and deep.

'Insyriated' (its UK title), although not perfect, turned out to be one of the most unsettling (as it ought to be considering the subject matter) and powerful films seen in the cinema this year to me. It is a very good film, almost great in fact, that is deserving seemingly of a wider release.

Visually, 'Insyriated' is highly atmospheric and startling. The cinematography keeps the viewer constantly at the heart of the action and gives a large amount of urgency while not going over-the-top. The editing is taut and adds to 'Insyriated's' unsettling nature, as does, and even more so, the sound editing. The lighting is haunting without being too dark. The sets are suitably confined, effectively giving a sense of claustrophobia. Philippe Van Leeuw directs with assurance and control of the subject matter, being more successful as director than as writer.

Parts of the script are tight and provoking. The story is never dull and treats its subject with an unnerving quality that really wrecks the nerves. The horrors, tension and suspense are not dealt with excessively or sledge-hammer-like nor are they sugar-coated or trivialised. Yet it doesn't hold back and takes no prisoners, which was appropriate and throughout there is a clear sense of danger.

The characters seem real and their conflicts easy to identify with every step of the way, even when they make misjudged decisions they also come over as meaning well which stops the viewer from getting frustrated at them. A great cast makes this possible, with the best performances coming from Hiam Abbass, Diamand Abou Abboud and Juliette Navis. The stages of the film where the truth of the events (primarily the shooting) is discovered are particularly well acted.

For all those strengths, there are a couple of shortcomings with 'Insyriated'. While the script is generally tight and thought-provoking, there are times where it lacks nuance and subtlety which would have given the harrowing, hard-edged tone a little more dimension. But it's the score that is the biggest issue, very mawkish and far too low-key in instrumentation which creates a completely out of kilter tone with the atmosphere, when either a more robust, stirring approach was far more suitable, just as effective would have been for the film to have no score.

Overall, very good and almost great which it could easily have been with a little more nuance and a far more appropriate music score. 8/10 Bethany Cox

28th STOCKHOLM INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL. DAY 4, NOV 11th 2017. Swedish premiere.

In an apartment in Damascus, in war-torn Syria, a matriarch is struggling, despite all odds, to keep her family and a neighbouring woman safe.

A Belgian-French-Lebanese co-production, "Insyriated" (2017), written and directed by Belgian cinematographer-turned-writer-director Philippe Van Leeuw, was shot in an apartment building in Beirut, Lebanon. With strong acting performances and well-balanced direction, this gripping drama is a feat of shattering realism.

By the time only a scant few minutes have elapsed already 'In Syria' is so profoundly impactful that only the word "excruciating" comes to mind. I'm immediately taken with Jean-Luc Fafchamps' quietly haunting score and Virginie Surdej's smart cinematography; a few notes and one slow pan of the camera speak volumes. The assembled cast have been on-screen for mere moments and already their acting comes across as so superbly nuanced and sincerely, emotionally wrought that I'm not at all surprised to learn how highly acclaimed this has been. So much about this film is superficially simple and uncomplicated - the premise, the plot, the production design and art direction, Philippe Van Leeuw's direction - yet there is a resounding intelligence and sharp finesse to every element, and the result is unfailingly stunning. Not one instant is wasted or anything less than piercing: this is as utterly phenomenal as it is difficult to watch.

Many movies have been made about the "horrors of war," but the most violent recreations will never hold a candle to the searing, unyielding drama of the more wide-ranging ramifications of conflict. Constant terror, impossible choices, forced isolation and containment, distrust, necessary strict conservation of limited resources, and the mounting pressures of crowded, guarded living are juxtaposed with reflections of love, tenderness, innocence, wistful hope for relief, and subtle intimations of what has been lost. This balance of contrasting sordidness, the bleak realities of our world, is more than enough to make the picture painfully, wretchedly upsetting. That discrete bursts of awful violence are peppered in, accentuating and amplifying the very personal and soul-destroying cost of such upheaval and all that comes with it, lets 'In Syria' turn the corner from "extremely depressing" to "abjectly horrifying." And still, that the feature maintains a considerably muted tone all the while, downplaying as much of the course of events as possible, only serves to heighten the effect of every last iota.

Filmmaker Van Leeuw has given us an immensely powerful, all too commonly relevant portrait of civilian life under the looming specter of war; this movie has a particular setting yet could just as easily take place in any time or country. Like the broadly low-key, tone, the singular space in which we meet our characters only fosters greater tension with the simultaneous feeling of claustrophobia but also being completely unable to leave such confinement for the terrible dangers beyond the walls. To that end: while everyone who worked on this is to be congratulated for their stellar contributions, not least Van Leeuw and the cast, it can't be overstated how important the work of the sound department is in this instance, even more than for other films. Except for outright horror films, I'm not sure when the last time was that I saw a feature in which audio and sound effects, portending doom and enormous peril that is unseen for the characters, audience, or both, was so majorly important to the viewing experience. That the inclusion here is so ruthlessly clear and pristine is a credit to all on hand for the significance it has in the presentation.

Not one word or title card needs to be appended to emphasize the crucial message underlying 'In Syria,' for this reflects the horrible truth of the dire circumstances of living in a war zone, a potential situation from which no one is entirely safe. By the same token, it requires no imagination at all to envision a similar scenario unfolding even outside the auspices of martial conflict specifically. And with that said, it can only be repeated that everything about the feature, what we see, hear, or feel, only augments the already pervasive, gnawing agitation the viewing experience inculcates. Only in the sense of how finely it's all executed could it be said this is a pleasant watch, for otherwise the film is distinctly, pointedly distressing; viewer discretion is necessarily advised just for the harrowing nature of the trauma involved. Even at that, however, Van Leeuw and his cast and crew have crafted a picture so mightily potent that the same three words apply here as to any of the worst headlines in real life: "don't look away." Rich and perfect in its construction, totally spellbinding in its finished form, 'In Syria' is a must-see.