Saeed is a young cinema passionate trying to teach the youth in Eastern Ghouta in Syria the rules of filming, but the reality they face is much harsher to respect any rule. His friend Milad is on the other side of the fence, in Damascus, under the control of the regime finishing his studies in Fine Arts. At one point, Milad decides to leave the capital and joins Saeed in under sieged Douma where they set up a local radio station and a recording studio. They hold the camera to film everything until one day the camera films them…

  More than two years have passed and the Syrian regime still besieges the Southern suburbs of Damascus where a population of more than 100,000 people live until today. During those two years, more than 200 died of hunger and the lack of medical care. The remaining still live under the siege, surviving only by what grows from the earth such as grass and other green leafs and vegetables. They fight the siege and hunger through hope and love they have learned to find during the hardest of time.      Director: Mattar Ismaeel Duration: 15:35 Produced by: Bidayyat  Year of production: 2015  

  Two women have given up on life; their words have stopped in their tracks. One exiles herself to silence; the other attempts to disappear in the company of four female poets who, before her, have attempted themselves to disappear in one way or another. A dialogue between one woman stuck in Damascus and another who had recently left the city. A dialogue between two worlds, internal and external—an impossible one.   This film has received the support of Bidayyat’s documentary grant 2015    

  The crowds fill the foreground, a river of thin bodies, faces packed between two parallel, receding lines of ruined buildings. The closest face is that of an elderly woman, wearing black shawl on her head. I’ve never seen an exhausted face with quite this kind of parched fatigue before. It is an epic image, it could be a canvas by some great artist, but the truth is it is just a single snapshot from the siege of the Yarmouk Camp in Damascus. How can an image such as this be beautiful, so very beautiful? We are used to describing colours as beautiful... more

" Siege" is the outcome of a workshop via Skype with twelve young people under siege in Yarmouk  Camp near Damascus since almost a year and a half. This film expresses four daily realities of this siege. While finalizing their films, the situation in Yarmouk got worse and it became difficult for them to meet together. They persevered and here are their intimate reflections.   Director: Abdullah al-Khatib, Deaa Yahea, Moayad Zaghmout, Baraa Nmrawi, Jamal Khalife, Mohammad Alsukari, Wassim Mnwar, Abdul Rahman Saleem, Omar Abdullah, Nawar Al-Youssef Duration: 9:14 min Year of production: 2015 Produced by: Bidayyat in partnership with Watad  

In early 2013, I was filing a report on the southern ring-road in Damascus, part of which had become the front-line between regime forces (on the city side) and the Free Syrian Army occupying the surrounding area. My work on the report got side-tracked by research into the history of this road, which is now the subject of my film. Planning for the road started in the 1970s and construction began in the 1980s—in fact, the very year I was born, directly beside the road in the Midan neighbourhood. It was never finished. The film tells the story of my relationship... more

When you can no longer rebel, when your country turns into a big prison, you walk In the same place you used to rebel in, your memory walks you, because the place has changed, or the people were killed, imprisoned, shelled, displaced A city split in 2, regime and liberated, and where is your place? Relax..you're in Damascus! Director: Azza Hamwi Duration: 6:49 min Year of production: 2015 Produced by: Bidayyat

Since the very beginning of the Syrian revolution, the actress May Skaaf got involved as a peaceful activist in the popular uprising of her country. As May rapidly took publicly position with the opposition movement against Bashar Al Assad and its regime while living in Damascus, she was subject to continuous harassment and threats by the security forces. Though having experienced several short arrests, May was always determined to stay in her home country. Eventually, in June 2013, the imminent threats of a longer arrest forced her to leave Damascus. But several days before her departure, Azza Al Hamwi documented... more

If the "MiG" didn't show up, it could've been just another ordinary day. But it was there, looking for love to shatter, and blow away the features of my exile the "camp", palestine's twin. The bedroom, the beautiful nights and the morning coffee were all exposed to the streets and the main square. At that very moment, Dunia my love and my wife, was dead to me. This movie is about the Palestinian refugee camp "al Yarmouk" on December 16th, when it was attacked by the Syrian regime's "MiGs", as a punishment for sheltering displaced Syrians & Palestinians whom lost their neighborhoods due... more