The Song of the Missing Men...Iraq
Thursday, February 8, 2018 at 02:11PM 
A Film by Layth Abdulamir 90 minutes Arabic with ENGLISH subtitles
Beyond the specific stories of its various communities, Iraqi director Layth Abdulamir has been able to capture and convey the thoughts and emotions of the people of his homeland. This has been a dangerous task, and a remarkable feat.
Within their common cultural, social and historical backgrounds, the Kurds,Turkmen, Shiahs, Sunnis, Yazidis or Christians, whether from cities, villages or farms, are all Iraqi.
This collective image comes together as the director and crew take us on a road trip that is the heart and soul of this film. We travel from the deep south with the Marshland People of Nasiriyah to the extreme northern part of Iraq with the People of Kurdistan. They are all different, and yet so much the same. A truly poignant journey. Al Fao, Basrah, Nasiriyah, Ur, Ali Al Gharbi, Nadjaf, Baghdad, Kirkouk, Sulaimaniya, Halabjah, Erbil, Lalech and Zakhu. . . the people, the places, their differences, and their similarities are all there for us to see for the first time.
Watch the Trailer here:
IRAQ_THE SONG OF THE MISSING MEN_TRAILER_1080_EN_MP4.mp4 from sarasotafringefilms on Vimeo.
The itinerary is nothing less than a panoramic geopolitical map of Iraq. We realize how the components of Iraqi society—which had once formed the mosaic of a secular nation—disintegrated when the coalition forces and the first armored vehicle entered the country of Mesopotamia. To introduce the concept of democracy to a nation of many peoples long controlled by dictatorship might be in hindsight considered a misstep. The filmmaker would like you to weigh in with your opinion before he returns to his native land for the sequel to this riveting, ongoing saga.
Iraqi music, and Iraqi voices underscore the film and underline an ancestral identity, which now seems permanently fractured.
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