REPUBLIC OF SILENCE (2021)

183 min - Documentary

Synopsis:

They grew up in the lands of dictators and surveillance, where images are censored, photos are burned, thoughts are discreet, and mouths are kept shut. Throughout the years, they made films, documented life, and their lives, at least what was possible. They recorded sounds at night and in secret, for the senses to complete the image. From what are seemingly scattered images and narratives, a coherent emotive sensibility emerges unpacking a singular perspective of history and an attempt to speak what has been unspoken and silenced. A first-person narrative pendulates between a perspective that is timelessly personal and intimate. Another, on the contrary, is very vast, contemporary, and political. It traces the journeys of a filmmaker and her partner, friends, and their families, once as revolutionaries in their country, once exiled in Europe nowadays, once as activists, as filmmakers, as lovers, and as listeners. A contemplative journey from silence into words, from blindness into seeing, and of how cinema made it all possible and saved their lives.

Director: Diana El Jeiroudi
Writer: Diana El Jeiroudi
Country: Germany, France, Syria, Qatar
Production: No Nation Films, Les films d’ici

Funds:

Doha Film Institute