paul2001sw-1 'A Syrian Love Story' charts the stresses on the marriage of a Syrian couple forced into exile as civil war takes grip of their homeland. As a documentary, it's uneasy viewing; as Ragdha slides into depression, one wonders at the morality of continuing to film. At the same time, the film struggles to provide any real insight into the wider political situation, perhaps because this is in essence a tale of isolation. While the story is sad, so are many peoples', and the couple's personal tragedy relegates the terrible fate of their country to a second tier. Oddly, this is a film where a bit more self-evident love amongst its protagonists might have allowed more insight into the state of their nation to emerge.

l_rawjalaurence This might seem a harsh judgment about a film charting the reaction of a Syrian family to the conflict within their country over a five- year period, but A SYRIAN LOVE STORY comes across as a shamelessly manipulative piece of filmmaking, where director Sean McAllister has deliberately shoehorned the struggles of his subjects into a clichéd piece of narrative.The story centers on Raghda and Amer, a couple living in Syria who both suffered the trauma of imprisonment for their revolutionary views. As the story opens, Raghda is still incarcerated and Amer has to look after their large family. With Syria gradually descending into anarchy, the family have to leave their country and decamp to Lebanon; eventually they are given asylum in France. But Raghda cannot forget her loyalty to her country, and so she departs once again for Syria to occupy a senior position in the rebel government, living partly in her own country and partly in the eastern Turkish town of Gaziantep. Meanwhile Amer continues to bring up the rest of the family in France while plying his trade as a farmer.The story is a poignant one, charting the ways in which personal feelings and political commitment often conflict with one another. Yet director McAllister continues to obtrude himself into the narrative, talking at one point about his own imprisonment in Syria, and freely associating with the family. This decision tends to divert attention away from the film's basic subject; are we really witnessing a depiction of an ordinary Syrian family, or concentrating instead on the director's relationship to that family?This conflict becomes more pronounced when the family are in France, and Raghda and Amer begin to play out their marital struggles for the camera. McAllister eggs them on with some shamefully leading questions, almost as if he wants to fit their arguments into a melodramatic narrative of his own making. There is a certain sense of absurdity about two Syrian people discussing one another's foibles for McAllister's camera in English rather than in their native language of Arabic.There are other devices that prove jarring; throughout the film Raghda and Amer's dialogue has been subtitled, even though their English pronunciation is perfectly comprehensible. The subtitles don't even reflect what they are saying, but provide a cleaned-up version of their syntax. McAllister himself resorts to using pidgin English, especially with the children, which makes it seem as it he positions himself as a privileged Westerner talking down to the Easterners.In the end nothing is resolved; but McAllister has his film, which presumably was his intention anyway.

Leofwine_draca Filmmaker Sean McAllister had the good fortune to be making a documentary in Syria at the time of civil unrest back in 2011 and this five-year-film explores the country's disintegration from the point of view of a family living there at the time. The husband is a former Palestinian terrorist, while the mother is a Syrian who makes the unwise decision of writing a book about the failings of the Assad regime. She's thrown in jail, and life becomes difficult for both the parents and their three children.This is a very well made documentary that lets the characters tell their own story without the filmmaker trying to get in the way or influence things. It's a grim and unsettling journey with no real happy endings; the husband is a flawed character unable to comprehend his wife's feelings, while the wife has more love for her country than she does for her family. What happens will surprise nobody, but the journey there is full of emotion and upset. I particularly liked the way the tough kids remained seemingly unfazed by what was occurring around them, so I guess there is a happy ending of sorts too.

Sam Louise Its been a few days since i watched this and its still playing on my mind. I understand that they come from a war zone but does a small child need to know their mother is being beaten daily? there is a callous disregard for sheltering their children from the horrors of the world and i find this the most unsettling thing of all. The Husbands failure to understand his wife was suffering with some sort of PTSD and required help rather than his constant accusal of her not loving him any more. I think i was traumatized just watching this. There is so much that happens, you cannot fathom their decision making process. Especially as parents. So much so that by the end of it, i did not actually feel sorry for them. It was exhausting to watch their inability to simply do the right thing, their lives overshadowed by their past.