Rojek

Filmmaker Zaynê Akyol puts a face to the often disembodied threat of Islamic State (ISIS). In prison camps in Syria, Akyol encounters dozens of detained IS fighters, men and women, who share a common dream: establishing a caliphate.

Confronted with their fundamentalist beliefs, Rojek attempts to trace the beginning, the rise and fall of ISIS through their personal stories. These up-close, unsettling interviews are set against imagery filmed around decimated, post-war Syrian Kurdistan.

This films offers an intimate, uncomfortable gaze at a complex, unknown reality, pointing to an ideological war that extends well beyond the ‘fall of ISIS’.