Escape: A story about exile and the fight for freedom
Directed by Danish Jonas Poher Rasmussen, the animated film run away Follows the true story of Amin, an Afghan refugee who fled his country in the late 1980s to reach Europe.
An intimate story: The deportation of an Afghan boy
Amin Nawabi is a young gay Afghan refugee who had to flee Afghanistan in the late 1980s as a child. Thirty years later, as a university student in Denmark, he agreed to tell his friend Jonas Poher Rasmussen his story. The journey into exile and the fight for freedom. ” I was 15 when I met Amin in Denmark. He came from Afghanistan alone and lives in a foster home, just around the corner from where I live. We passed each other every morning at the bus stop, on our way to high school, and gradually became best friends. It was 25 years ago confides the director during an interview with High and Short Distribution.
The Danish director chooses animation to transcribe Amin’s story. His childhood in Kabul in the 1980s. His father’s arrest under the communist regime, then his disappearance. His family fled during the civil war, before the Taliban took power. The years of hiding in Russia. Police violence. Crossing the Baltic Sea thanks to smugglers. Air travel with fake passports. Separation from his family. Those who manage to reach Sweden. Those who remain in Russia. His arrival alone at 16 in Denmark. The administrative process of an asylum seeker.
Amin returned to a painful and traumatic past. ” I think some parts of the movie are really hard to watch. Even though this is my story and I’ve seen it many times, I’m still quite emotional. And there are some parts that I really struggle to watch “said Amin in a magazine interview NEON. However, he wants people to see his story.
Today, the young man is installed with his Danish companion Kasper. Homosexuality is illegal in Afghanistan. Thus, the documentary returns to the search for identity of a young homosexual to express it to his family, find his place in society, and live freely.
A political history: The universal dimension of such a story
The documentary gives sensitivity to the universal scale of these forced exiles. run awaymeaning to flee in French, tells the story of those forced to leave their homes to flee armed conflicts, to flee dictatorial regimes, to flee social hardship, to flee persecution.
It gives a look at this eternal fight, the escape throughout his life to find a place in the world to live safely. To find a place we can consider our new home.
” What does home mean to you? House? It is a safe place “.
As of May 2022, more than 100 million people were uprooted worldwide due to persecution, conflict, violence, human rights violations or serious disruptions to public order, according to UNHCR’s annual report on global trends.
” Every year for the past decade the numbers have continued to rise said UN High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi. ” Either the international community acts to respond to this human tragedy, to end conflicts and achieve lasting solutions, or this dramatic trend will continue. “.
In an interview with NEON magazine, executive producer Riz Ahmed said ” it’s rare to find a film that talks so much about the moment we live in today “. In fact, the tragedies of refugees are repeated. Recently, the invasion of Russia in Ukraine – which caused the fastest and one of the biggest crises in forced migration since the Second World War – and other emergencies , as in Afghanistan since the Taliban returned to Kabul. However, the director in an interview with CBS Mornings, reminds that refugees are not just refugees. They are also people. They are more. They also have the right to dream and have ambition.
run away can it change public opinion on accepting refugees in Europe? In 2015, in a survey conducted by Ifop for Le Figaro on the reception of migrants from the Mediterranean, only 46% of those polled said they were in favor of France taking in some of these refugees.
Awarded at many festivals
The Danish, French, Norwegian and Swedish animated documentary is one of the most acclaimed and award-winning films of 2021. the 94th Academy Awards: for Best Animated Film, Best International Film and Best Documentary Film.
According to the co-producers (the Rennes production company Vivement Lundi), ” This is the first time that a documentary has been nominated in three different categories. Far from over. We said to ourselves, if there is a nomination, it’s very strong, we feel something is happening explains Jean-François Le Corre. Awarded at many festivals, run away won not only the grand prize for documentary film at the Sundance festival, the crystal for feature film at the Annecy international festival; but there are also three prizes at the 34th European Film Awards: Best Animated Film, Best European Documentary and the European Universities Prize.
Modeled after the American Oscars, these “awards” reward each year the best of European cinema. Within the selection, films of all genres from different backgrounds thus reflect the diversity of European cinema.
” I want to thank Amin, my friend. Thank you for your trust, your generosity and your courage, thank you very much. – Jonas Poher Rasmussen
