Cultural Writing. Middle Eastern Studies. Film Studies. The first book in English on a little known cinema from a key part of the Middle East. This timely collection offers critical essays and historical overview of film production in Syria, as well as brings together words and texts from several of Syria's most critically acclaimed and internationally celebrated masters of cinema, including Nabil el-Maleh, Samir Zikra, Omar Amiralay, Mohammad Malas, Abdellatif Abdul-Hamid and Oussama Mohammad. In their own words, the filmmakers offer candid commentary and compelling insights into their relationship with their craft and their struggle to make films in a developing country under single-party rule, where civil freedoms have been held captive to emergency laws for over three decades. This collection offers a rare glimpse at how they managed the remarkable feat of creating an intransigently independent cinema in spite of near impossible conditions. Edited by Rasha Salti and co-published with ArteEast.