An estimated 13 million people have been displaced since the Syrian conflict began in 2011, a large number of them making their way across the border into neighbouring Lebanon. This nuts-and-bolts documentary from London-based filmmaking sisters Sophia and Georgia Scott explores the lives of four such refugees, putting a human face on an unimaginably vast tragedy.
Their subjects are a diverse, likeable bunch: Sheik Abdo is a community leader who regularly comes into conflict with the Lebanese police; Nemr is his assistant, a baby-faced uni student who hasn’t seen his mother in years; Reem is a young woman who has set up an unofficial charity to help her fellow refugees; and Mwafak is a hippy artist, the kind of mildly irritating go-with-the-flow bro who seems to pop up in every culture worldwide.
Their stories are interesting, but ‘Lost in Lebanon’ is a bit too TV-doc drab to fully engage, relying heavily on printed on-screen info to fill in the gaps in its story. We’re told a lot about the struggles these hardy people have endured, but rarely are we made to feel them.
