Viewings
Lies and a new life A refugee’s story
THE MOVIE FLEE follows refugee Amin Nawabi and his ordeal to find a new home after leaving Afghanistan. This animated feature film uses sequences that look hand-drawn, interspersed with real footage. It is about the struggle to find a country that accepts Amin as a refugee, but it also talks about the price a refugee pays for leaving home, whether their journey is successful or not. Amin’s family loses their father when he is still young. After being imprisoned by the communist government of Afghanistan, he vanishes from jail without explanation. The family is still waiting for answers about his fate when the fight between the Mujahedeen and government troops reaches the capital, Kabul. Leaving everything behind, the family flees to Russia. Here they hide, always fearful of being discovered, and dependent on the support of others. Their exile starts a constant cycle of paying smugglers for attempts to reach Europe, only to be defrauded of the money, or being discovered escaping and sent back to Russia. Between these escape attempts they wait in a legal limbo while hiding from the police, only protected by anonymity and sometimes a well-placed bribe.
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Signals 139 Winter 2022
