Rojek

The main part of the film are the intense and at times intimate interviews of captive ISIS members held by the SDF forces in Northern Syria. The interviews are made with a close up with the interviewees who tell their experiences, views, regrets, dreams and nightmares to the viewer. These are coupled with some scenes of everyday life of the SDF forces near to the prison camps. The interviews are almost like a therapy sessions, where the ISIS members reflect on the decision they have made and their consequences, with differing conclusions. Some of them take the viewer very close to the interviewees, making them an intimate experience. The shots and scenes outside the interviews are technically interesting and offer a glimpse to the everyday realities of the conflict. They resemble very much the scenes in Notturno, another documentary about Syrian war that was also showed in the DocPoint film festival two years ago.

While well made and thoutfully filmed, in 2 hours it repeats a lot of similar footage and the interviews also start to get a bit repetitive at some point. However, it offers a unique glimpse into the minds of former ISIS members and post war trauma, which is worth a watch for those interested in the subject.