PURPLE SEA

A blouse with a print of butterflies frolicking in water. Sneakers, jeans, a belt from a coat. So many familiar details to cling to in the chaos: in the middle of the Mediterranean, among a group of migrants. They fled war and are now trying to survive after capsizing. We spot them, like fragments scattered on the deep blue sea, some wearing bright orange life jackets. When the camera plunges, muffling their cries, the Syrian woman who captured the images becomes the narrator. She talks to the person she was trying to reach, to the world, to all of us. She gives a voice and identity to people who all too often become statistics, their voices drowned in the waves. A chilling but essential film.