Ayouni
“a powerful and urgent documentary tribute” Peter Bradshaw, The Guardian “Compelling and empowering”, The UpcomingCommendation, RAI Film Prize, 2021
Noura and Machi search for answers about their loved ones – Bassel Safadi and Paolo Dall’Oglio, who are among the over 100,000 forcibly disappeared in Syria. Faced with the limbo of an overwhelming absence of information, hope is the only thing they have to hold on to. ‘Ayouni’ is a deeply resonant Arabic term ofendearment - meaning ‘my eyes’ and understood as ‘my love’. Filmed over 6 years and across multiple countries in search of answers, Ayouni is an attempt to give numbers faces, to give silence a voice, and to make the invisible undeniably visible.
Available to view on:
https://ayounifilm.com/ & True Story
Selected Press
Boston Globe - Doc Talk: bearing witness, creating Oz, watching whales
MovieMaker -
podcast here
& article: The Syrian Regime Disappeared Their Friend — the Film AyouniRemembers Him
Modern Times Review - The abductions and disappearance of over 100,000 Syrians reveal yet another aspect of a cruel war strategy.
Nina Roth - ‘Ayouni’ by Yasmin Fedda: Freedom is a double decker to Damascus
France 24 - Love and Loss in a time of revolution: ‘Ayouni’ documents the forcibly disappeared in Syria, 2020
France 24 - ‘Ayouni’, the documentary film that puts a face to Syria’s forcibly disappeared, 2020
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Premiere: CPH:DOX 2020
A co-production with Banyak Films & Hakawati
Filmed by Yasmin Fedda & Hugh Hartdord, editied by Tom Ernst & Greg Pittard, sound design & composition James Bulley, produced by Hugh Hartford & Elhum Shakerifar, directed by Yasmin Fedda
Supported by SANAD, Cap Kuwait, Amnesty International and BFI Vision Award. Working closely with #FREEBASSEL campaign and Families For Freedom.
