The Amina Profile

Can an online filtration turn into a desperate quest to the ends of the world, involving various intelligence agencies, top-tier global media and activist organisations? Amina Arraf, a pretty Syrian-American revolutionary and Montrealer Sandra Bagaria meet online and for the next few months they will spend endless hours in heated conversations about love and politics. With Sandra’s encouragement, Amina launches the provocatively named blog “A Gay Girl in Damascus” about what it means to be a lesbian in modern-day Syria. As the Syrian uprising gains momentum, the blog attracts a huge following, revealing a brave revolutionary who has no qualms about standing up to her oppressors. But it’s Amina’s subsequent abduction that sparks an international outcry to free her. As Sandra’s agony reaches fever pitch, a new mystery rises to the surface: who is Amina and why has she dropped off the face of the earth? Director Sophie Deraspe travels from San Francisco and Washington to Istanbul, Tel Aviv and Beirut to meet the key players in this thoroughly modern tale of technology, love and news-as-spectacle that questions the ways in which people connect in today’s virtual world.