Syrian film wins awards at Venice Film Festival

Documentaries also have their place in the Venice Film Festival, and the Syrian documentary that follows two friends through four horrific years in the Syrian conflict has won major awards at the Venice Film Festival, which concludes on Saturday.

The film “Lessa Amma Records” by Ghayath Ayoub and Saeed Al-Batal documents the situation of art students in the midst of the Syrian revolution.

The film won two awards at the "Critics Week" at the Venice Film Festival.

In 2011, friends Said and Milad leave Damascus for opposition-held Douma to set up a radio station and recording studio.

They strive to maintain a glimmer of hope and creativity in the midst of battles, siege and starvation.

Ayoub and al-Batal, who created the film based on 500 hours of footage, told AFP that with little press information coming from Syria, it was important for them to document what happened.

"We started doing this because of the absence of any effective journalistic work in Syria, because journalists are prevented from entering, and if they are allowed, they are under the supervision of the regime," al-Batal said.

The Venice Festival concludes on Saturday evening.