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BERIK / DANIEL JOSEPH BORGMAN / CRITICS’ WEEK
WHEN FRIENDSHIP COMES KNOCKING “The film takes place in Semey, close to the primary nuclear testing station of the Soviet Union, where more than 450 explosions where conducted between 1949 and 1989.” For the second year running New Zealand born, Danish director Daniel Joseph Borgman has a short fiction film selected in Cannes, this year in the Critics’ Week programme. Berik is a story about friendship and lonesomeness in one of the world’s most remote regions.
The film takes place in Semey, close to the primary nuclear testing station of the Soviet Union, where more than 450 explosions where conducted between 1949 and 1989. Today, Semey is a town with a population exceeding 300,000 and has a large expatriate scientific community attached to the university and the testing site labs.
BY ANDERS BUDTZ-JØRGENSEN
CLOSE TO REALITY
Berik was born blind and deformed. His disability has been caused by radioactive pollution. He spends his days at home – in Semey, Eastern Kazakhstan – alone waiting for his brother to come home from work. That is, until Adil, the smallest and least popular of the kids in the apartment block, comes knocking on his door. UNIVERSES BEYOND OUR OWN
“Both myself and my producer Katja Adomeit are interested in universes outside of our own and in working with real people – and trying to construct a fiction which exists in a kind of reality. Berik is a real person who has had a tragic life, but he still seems so positive and he is a great character.”
In his preparations for Berik, Borgman was very clear that there could be difficulties in making a fictional film that sticks very close to reality. All the characters are non-actors using their real names in the film. It was essential for Borgman that his film should not be passed off as a documentary. While the story remains close to reality, the viewer has no doubt that he is watching fiction. “It is dangerous to blend fact and fiction if the reality being portrayed is not your own. A lot of people have actually suggested that we should make a documentary about Berik. But I am a fictional director.” “We tried to take as many elements out of Berik’s life as we could and find a narrative that would fit
together with reality. We didn’t, for instance, shoot in his home. We had to shift for artistic reasons. We had to change some things, but we tried to stay true to what the city was like and what the people were like. When you have a universal narrative you can go anywhere and use as many elements as possible from reality and still tell a story that is compelling for a broad audience.” And to Borgman the story has a clear and universal message. “You can find friendship in places where you would least expect. Adil wants to be a part of the group of kids, but in the end he finds out that it is more important to be happy with a real friend, than to fit in”. MARGINALISED AND INNOCENT
Last year Borgman participated in the official short film programme at Cannes with Lars and Peter, a film which described the relationship between a father and son after the mother’s death. Berik also examines the relationship between a grown-up and a child. According to Borgman, the feelings of children are often marginalised in an adult world. This is one of the reasons children so often play a