Having won over hearts and minds throughout this year’s film festival circuit, Sirens, a documentary capturing the trials and tribulations of Slave To Sirens, one of the first all-female metal bands to have emerged from the Middle East, has shared its first official trailer. The hard-hitting clip comes as the film prepares to blow the minds of a wider audience with a more extensive cinematic release.
A gripping, unblinking stare-down of the everyday challenges faced by bandmates Shery, Maya, Lilas, Alma and Tatyana, Sirens has already received critical acclaim since its initial debut at Sundance Film Festival. The film depicts how the group navigates the already tricky paths of friendship, identity, art and sexuality made all the more treacherous by prevailing social norms, including but certainly not limited to the criminalisation of homosexuality in their homeland. “If we don’t protect our right to sing today, we will surely lose our right to speak tomorrow”, we hear in the trailer, “Any time a woman wants to be anything other than what society wants…it’s always an issue.”
The urgent and timely message of Sirens is resonating deeply with audiences, taking home four awards so far including the Special Jury Award for Courage in Filmmaking from the Florida Film Festival. Set to the backdrop of director Rita Baghdadi’s intense storytelling, as well as an all-star executive production unit made up of Natasha Lyonne (Russian Doll, American Pie) and Maya Rudolph (Grown Ups, Bridesmaids), it’s a safe bet that these are merely the first steps of Sirens’ award-winning run.
Slave To Sirens not only confirm the hype of the documentary, but surpass it, letting their original music do its fair share of the talking. Earlier in the year, the band shared ‘Salomé’, a jagged, blistering new skull for their crown already featuring on their debut EP Terminal Leeches. With technical badassery and the wherewithal to weave it into focused brutality, Slave To Sirens are now barrelling towards what will be their first full-length album.
Though Sirens did screen at Sydney Film Festival, at the time of publication there’s no news of a wider Australian release. We’ll be sure to update that if plan changes, or you keep an eye out for yourself on the official website.
Watch the Sirens trailer below.
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