Salaam Dunk

To the Iraqi students making up the female basketball team featured in this documentary, playing the game is about much more than just sports: it means freedom and the opportunity to start a new life after the horrors of war. For the first time in their young lives, they are competing together with teammates from other religions and ethic groups. Safa, the Arab manager and team "mother," admits to having focused primarily on her Arab players at first. But that soon changed: "I had to think as a manager, not as an Arab." The team's enthusiastic American trainer Ryan emphasizes what they have in common, not their differences. His main aim is to gear the young women up for new games. The team has lost every game so far - females have only recently been permitted to participate in sports even to a limited extent, meaning they lack both stamina and skill. But it's clear that they have no lack of ambition. We watch them as they progress through a season of training and competition. The girls speak openheartedly about their backgrounds, their dreams for the future, coping with the war, what it's like to be a woman in a man's world, and how basketball has given them a sense of freedom.