The film tells the story of our three weeks there this past summer. I don't want to spoil here what were for us many surprising encounters and events ... from the disturbing to the absurd. But, I can say that I was able to walk the streets and talk to whomever I wished. And I was able to visit officials if I so chose. Some special requests were denied but other serendipitous encounters made up for what we didn't achieve.
And for the most part, people were open about their hopes and fears. As to how the war began, they had a consistent narrative: That the protesters that took to the streets in 2011 had legitimate demands, but that the demonstrations were quickly hijacked by foreign backed jihadists. They reject the idea that Western-backed rebels are "moderates" as they are often termed in the US. There is a tendency to conflate all armed groups opposing the regime as sectarian extremists.
At the same time, not everyone loves Assad. But I had to learn how to listen for that. Their way of expressing this was never to criticize the president directly -- that is a line no one dares cross. Instead, people would simply stress their love of Syria. Others might talk about supporting the government, but that "was not because we love the regime" as one man put it, but because "we don't want the collapse of the state." They saw what happened in Iraq after Saddam, and in Libya after Qaddafi. They watched as state infrastructure -- schools, hospitals, police, water, electricity -- crumbled with the fall of central government, and they don't want to the same to happen to them.
As to how the war might end, "only God knows" is the best answer I heard. It may be the most honest.
In the end, I came away with one big thought that should be obvious but I don't think is. That is that the goal here should not be to win, to either vanquish Assad and his regime, or if you are a loyalist, to defeat all the rebels. At this point in the war, it's hard to see how either objective is attainable.
The goal should be to stop the killing. Perhaps new borders will need to be drawn, as some have suggested, with some accommodations made for Assad to remain in power for the near term and some accommodations made to grant the rebels some autonomy.