VOA慢速英语2014 Syrian Films Tell of Horror, Hope

 

AS IT IS 2014-11-09 Syrian Films Tell of Horror, Hope

Syrian filmmakers have been attending film festivals in Europe. Last week, the filmmakers attended the showing of a film called “Our Terrible Country." The movie explores two men and their friendship at a time of kidnappings, war and exile.

Artists say Syrian films turn up the voices of the “real” Syrian people, who after years of suffering, refuse to accept tyranny. 

In this documentary, a young man named Ziad laughs with his white-haired friend Yassin. They are in Turkey. They fled Syria after Ziad was captured and tortured by Islamic State militants¹. Yassin is in exile, fearing both Islamic State forces and the Syrian government.

Ali Atassi directed “Our Terrible Country." He says the movie is not about the past, but what happened as they were producing the documentary.

“I did stop shooting when Ziad was arrested by the Islamic State. I continued with Yassin, and when he was released later, we continued and he came back to join us in Istanbul and there the film took end.”

While imprisoned², Ziad wondered if people like him and his friends are to blame for the Syrian conflict. They once dreamed of overthrowing³ the government of President Bashar al-Assad with peaceful protests. But nearly 200,000 people have died in the fighting.

Ali Atassi says the film asks more questions than it answers. But he thinks the voices of secular⁴ activists⁵ are necessary for rebuilding Syria after the war ends. Those voices, he adds, are often marginalized by the media. He says the media like to describe Syrians as Islamist extremists, rebels, or supporters of the Assad government.

“We fought from the beginning and we will continue in our way.  And we belong to the society.  I do not think the Islamists or Assad belong to the future of Syria.  The media do not want to see us.  But we are here.”

Ali Atassi says Syrians inside the country need to hear moderate voices.

“If you look to the role that the culture in general, but also the cinema and short movie, can play in this struggle, I think it is a major role.  It is not about arms and army and invasion that we can deal with the Islamists only.  But also it is a cultural struggle.  It is about some value.  It is about the idea of the future of Syria.

The Syrian aid group Bidayyat produced “Our Terrible Country.” It is just one of a number of documentaries made in and around Syria. One of them is called “Being Good So Far, Part 2.”

In this new short film, boys sing about freedom as they ride on the back of a truck in the city of Aleppo. In the song, Mr. Assad is not even human, and the supposed “moderate” rebels are rats that flee when they are bombed.   

The general coordinator⁶ of Bidayyat, Christin Luettich, says it is this kind of complexity⁷ that gets lost in news reporting.

The films have subtitles⁸ in English. Bidayyat’s website is in both Arabic and English. Christin Luettich says one filmmaker has been killed since the group started supporting artists last year. In addition, Islamic State militants are holding other people involved with the project as hostages. 

Despite the continued horror, she says, filmmakers give her hope that one day there will be a peaceful Syria.

“All the people that I meet though the work we are doing in the last three years really give me a lot of hope because I see how much they are willing to contribute to the development of the country.  How much they are willing to defend the values that they have in mind.”

Christin Luettich adds one of those values is the dream of a Syrian democracy that includes all the people -- without dictators and violent extremists.  

Words in this Story 

torture - v. to cause severe pain; n. the act of causing severe pain in order to harm, to punish or to get information

tyranny – n. cruel and unfair treatment by people with power over others

marginalize – v. to put or keep (someone) in a powerless or unimportant position within a society or group

subtitle– n. words that appear with pictures during a movie, video, or television show and that explain what the actors are saying

1 militants   

激进分子，好斗分子( militant的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The militants have been sporadically fighting the government for years. 几年来，反叛分子一直对政府实施零星的战斗。
• Despite the onslaught, Palestinian militants managed to fire off rockets. 尽管如此，巴勒斯坦的激进分子仍然发射导弹。

2 imprisoned   

下狱，监禁( imprison的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• He was imprisoned for two concurrent terms of 30 months and 18 months. 他被判处30个月和18个月的监禁，合并执行。
• They were imprisoned for possession of drugs. 他们因拥有毒品而被监禁。

3 overthrowing   

v.打倒，推翻( overthrow的现在分词 )；使终止

参考例句：

• They succeeded in overthrowing the fascist dictatorship. 他们成功推翻了法西斯独裁统治。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• I always delight in overthrowing those kinds of schemes. 我一向喜欢戳穿人家的诡计。 来自辞典例句

4 secular   

n.牧师，凡人；adj.世俗的，现世的，不朽的

参考例句：

• We live in an increasingly secular society.我们生活在一个日益非宗教的社会。
• Britain is a plural society in which the secular predominates.英国是个世俗主导的多元社会。

5 activists   

n.（政治活动的）积极分子，活动家( activist的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• His research work was attacked by animal rights activists . 他的研究受到了动物权益维护者的抨击。
• Party activists with lower middle class pedigrees are numerous. 党的激进分子中有很多出身于中产阶级下层。 来自《简明英汉词典》

6 coordinator   

n.协调人

参考例句：

• The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, headed by the Emergency Relief Coordinator, coordinates all UN emergency relief. 联合国人道主义事务协调厅在紧急救济协调员领导下，负责协调联合国的所有紧急救济工作。
• How am I supposed to find the client-relations coordinator? 我怎么才能找到客户关系协调员的办公室？

7 complexity   

n.复杂(性)，复杂的事物

参考例句：

• Only now did he understand the full complexity of the problem.直到现在他才明白这一问题的全部复杂性。
• The complexity of the road map puzzled me.错综复杂的公路图把我搞糊涂了。

8 subtitles   

n.说明字幕，印在外国影片上的对白翻译字幕，译文对白字幕；小标题，副标题( subtitle的名词复数 )；（电影的）字幕

参考例句：

• subtitles for the deaf and the hard of hearing 为耳聋和听力不佳者打出的字幕
• a Polish film with English subtitles 附有英语字幕的波兰影片