Storming Paradise

'We are dying to live'

Doxy

What drives young Western men to leave everything and everyone behind and travel to Syria to join other people's struggles? Floor van der Meulen (24) seeks out Dutch jihad fighters on the Syrian border.
Boys like the ones she has known from the neighbourhood of her youth and now portrayed in the media as vulnerable and derailed youngsters who could pose a terror threat.
But is this image accurate?

She gets to speak at length to a Dutch jihad fighter for the first time; Abu Gharib (27) has turned his back on the Netherlands to live as an al-Qaida fighter. 'The people fighting on the side of Assad, they torture in the most horrible way. We don't do that. We don't torture people. I just shoot them.'

Credits

Director • Floor van der Meulen
DoP •
Sound • Taco Drijfhout
Editor • Michiel Boesveldt
Sounddesign & mixage • Tom Jansen, Taco Drijfhout
Executive producer • Sylvia Baan
Production leader • Coen Soepboer
Production Syrië/Turkije • Isabel Hunter, Reber Dosky
Final editing BNNVARA • Sjoerd van den Broek
Producer •
With support of • CoBO

Festivals

Golden Calf Competition Netherlands Film Festival 2014
Debut Competition of Netherlands Film Festival 2014

Prijzen

Nominatie TV-Beelden 2015 Beste Actuele Programma

Stills