Young Algerian journalist Nedjma is investigating Islamic accounts of paradise. She is particularly interested in the descriptions used by Salafi preachers to recruit young Algerian men as jihadists. She and her colleague Mustapha find a number of disturbing, richly embellished video sermons and decide to explore the phenomenon in more detail. Travelling through the country, she has conversations with numerous people including astute intellectuals, naïve young men, enlightened religious scholars and political activists. It becomes clear that globalisation has contributed to what has now become an unbridled market for religion. Paradise has become a desirable commodity, expensively promoted by Wahhabis who are engaged in a struggle to impose theirs as the correct reading of the Koran, namely: sex and drugs are forbidden on earth but in heaven there are women and there is wine. (Festival information)
Investigating Paradise
Directed by
2017
Information
Festivals
Ildikó Enyedi's "On Body and Soul" is the winner of the Berlinale 2017. The film not only carried off the Golden Bear but also the Prize of the Ecumenical Jury.
Related content
List of church film prizes 2017