Amin was never outspoken about how he made his way from Afghanistan to Denmark in 1995, as a young refugee, so Rasmussen decided to bring the truth into the lives of Afghan refugees after the Taliban took control of the capital, Kabul, in the movie “Fly”. (Flee)”.
“Flee (Escape), is a Danish animated documentary film, produced in 2021, that won the Jury Prize at the Sundance World Film Festival, a famous independent film festival in America..
escape
The film begins with the voice of Amin Nawabi (a pseudonym chosen by the director to conceal the identity of the owner of the true story), who is currently a university professor, married and has children, and does not want to threaten his life that he built.
The life that Amin built is haunted by an ancient secret from the past, which he never told anyone, the director tells, so he decided to change his gif, names and locations to protect his identity..
Amin’s voice inside the film has not changed, but rather remained the same (the real voice of the Afghan refugee), this voice inside the film takes us to the refugee’s childhood in Afghanistan in the eighties of the last century.
More chaotic memories are presented in the film, after the Taliban seized power in Kabul in 1995, before its fall at the hands of US forces in November 2001.
inside the film; Suddenly Amin’s memories turn to what happened before he fled Afghanistan, where his sister was kidnapped, and his father, mother, and brother were all killed..
Next comes the story of Amin’s escape from Afghanistan to Russia, and then via people smugglers to Estonia (which during the film turns out to be a miserable period for an Afghan refugee in an asylum center).“.
From Estonia he arrives in Denmark, which grants him refugee status. At the age of 15, in rural Danish, the Afghan refugee meets Rasmussen (the film’s director) on the bus to school..
Motherland
At the beginning of the film, Rasmussen asks Amin: “What does homeland mean to you?” Amin’s face appears astonished and says: “A homeland?” Then he continues: “Home is a safe place.“.
Rasmussen says: “I’ve always been curious about his past, his story, but as a 15-year-old boy, I don’t really get into these things, I had to wait until he was ready to tell me.”“.
Rasmussen continues: “We have always kept in touch, spent almost every New Year together for many years, and went on holidays together.“.
He adds: “Maybe 15 years ago, I asked him if I could make a documentary about his story, and he said then that he was not ready, but when he was going to share his story with me, I knew that this was something we would do at some point, so I was looking for the right form to do it.“.
As for the film’s producer, Monica Hellström, noted that animation was “the way the makers came up with to keep Amin’s identity anonymous.”.
And she indicated, according to what was reported by the American website “The Hollywood Reporter”, that the animation “helped solve the problem of how to film scenes from his past,” saying: “They are things that we would not have been able to portray in an ordinary documentary film.”“.
She continued: “You end up getting really obsessed and looking for weird things, like how high the sidewalk was in the streets, what kind of trees there were, how light was at that time of year.“.
“I think these details, which you might not even notice, can really communicate the mood of the place,” she said.“.
Animator Kenneth Ladequiere said he made minor modifications to protect Amin’s true identity, properly copying Amin’s aspects and behavior, such as the way he points and speaks, and wipes away his tears when he cries.
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