- Title: Afghan refugee shares 'secret' story in acclaimed animated film 'Flee'
- Date: 7th February 2022
- Summary: COPENHAGEN, DENMARK (JANUARY 21, 2022) (REUTERS) (SOUNDBITE) (English) FILMMAKER, JONAS POHER RASMUSSEN, SAYING: "The film really was born out of me being curious about my friend. I didn't think 'I want to do a refugee story' and then went out and found a refugee. This was really about friendship, just as much as about refugees, you know, and about having secrets. And then
- Embargoed: 21st February 2022 12:46
- Keywords: Afghanistan film Afghanistan refugees Flee Flee documentary Flee film Jonas Poher Rasmussen animated movie
- Location: VARIOUS
- City: VARIOUS
- Country: Denmark
- Topics: Arts/Culture/Entertainment,Europe,Film
- Reuters ID: LVA00AFXOBHAL
- Aspect Ratio: 16:9
- Story Text: When filmmaker Jonas Poher Rasmussen was 15 years old, a lone teenage Afghan boy arrived in his rural Danish village. Word soon got out that the youngster had fled after his entire family had been killed and made the long journey to the Scandinavian country on foot. Over the years, the two became close friends but it took nearly 20 years until the now successful academic felt ready to tell Rasmussen what really happened.
That story is told in "Flee", an animated feature film in which Rasmussen's friend opens up for the first time under the pseudonym of Amin Nawabi, reliving his past trauma and recounting his escape from Afghanistan and the journey of self discovery that followed.
"From the very beginning, I was curious about, you know, why did he come and and how, but he didn't want to talk about it. And I, of course, respected that. But our friendship grew and this thing, this story was this kind of black box in our friendship that there's this thing he didn't really want to touch on," Rasmussen, now 40, told Reuters.
Rasmussen has a background in radio and he applied the techniques of the trade, asking Amin to lay down, close his eyes and describe his memories in detail during the around ten interviews they conducted over the span of nearly four years. It was a long process until Amin felt ready to share the secrets that were haunting him and affecting his relationship with his soon to be husband, said Rasmussen.
The film mixes animation with real historic archive footage of Afghanistan in the 80s, Moscow, where Amin's family fled, after the fall of the Soviet Union and tragic migrants crossings in Europe which involved his family members.
"The animation was really to make sure that we could bring the past back alive because most of the story takes place in the past, but also because it's a very subjective story and it's really about memory and trauma," said Rasmussen.
"And then putting in the archival footage was really about reminding people that this is a true story and underneath everything is real life. You should feel like when you scratch the animation that underneath you have the real person and you have the real events underneath."
Rasmussen said he initially set out to tell a story about friendship and secrets but when the 2015 migrant crisis erupted in Europe a year or two into the making of the movie, his perspective changed.
"I felt the need to give the refugees we saw on the highways in Denmark and the rest of Europe, a human face...and show that being a refugee is not an identity. It's a life circumstance that you kind of go through and then hopefully you go through it and you get out on the other side and you can start building a life for yourself."
"Flee" premiered to great acclaim at Sundance a year ago, winning the festival's Grand Jury Prize and went on to pick up several awards over 2021. The film was nominated for two BAFTA awards last week and has been shortlisted in the Documentary Feature and International Feature Film categories at the 2022 Oscars, while also being eligible for an Animated Feature nod.
Amid the film's victorious launch, Afghanistan once again made the headlines last year as the Taliban took control of the country and thousands of civilians thronged Kabul airport seeking to escape, making the film "sadly relevant all of a sudden", said Rasmussen.
"It was just really heartbreaking. But you know it also became even more important to get a nuanced story out there and really show, you know, how refugees are human beings like the rest of us with complex backstories and lives as everyone else," he said.
Opening up about his past and sharing his secret has brought Amin peace, said Rasmussen, adding that the positive feedback has further helped his friend.
"He is really happy about it. I think having kept the story a secret for so long, all of a sudden being able to share it and share it with the world and seeing that people could actually relate to the story, it really means a lot to him," he said.
"He's kind of a double marginalised being both gay and a refugee. So just the fact that people are relating to his story really means the world to him."
"Flee" is released in UK cinemas on February 11. The 2022 Academy Award nominations will be announced on Tuesday (February 8).
(Production: Hanna Rantala) - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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