Departure into the unknown
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| Original title | Departure into the unknown |
 | |
| Country of production |
Germany , South Africa |
| original language |
German , English |
| Publishing year | 2017 |
| length | 88 minutes |
| Rod | |
| Director | Kai Wessel |
| script |
Eva Zahn , Volker A. Zahn , Gabriela Zerhau |
| production |
Eric Moss , Kirsten Hager |
| music | Manu short |
| camera | Nicolay Gutscher |
| cut | Tina Friday |
| occupation | |
| |
Departure into the Unknown is a German-South African television film from 2017 . The dystopia is characterized in reversing the contemporary situation the image of Europeans from the middle class who are forced due to the political situation in their homeland to escape to Africa.
It premiered on October 27, 2017 at the Hof International Film Festival , and the film was shown on television on February 14, 2018 in Das Erste .
action
At the end of the 2020s, the European Union disintegrated and right-wing extremists rule in the former member states . In Germany, political opponents and minorities are massively persecuted as “ enemies of the German people ”, and conditions similar to civil war prevail on the streets .
After he was denounced, tenancy lawyer Jan Schneider fears arrest and torture again for representing the victims of state expropriations. He, his wife Sarah and their two children Nora and Niki flee in a hurry on a cargo ship that is supposed to take them to South Africa, the only country still taking in refugees. But they are released in rubber dinghies at sea and capsize on the Namibian coast. Seven-year-old Niki has been missing since then.
In Namibia, European refugees are deported to their countries of origin because they have been declared safe countries of origin . That is why the family evades registration and lets smugglers bring them to South Africa in a truck. You are accommodated in a refugee camp. Her application for asylum was rejected there because the mother was registered by the police in Namibia when she reported Niki missing. The family is threatened with deportation .
Shortly thereafter, a badly injured boy turns up and finds Niki's jacket with his ID. It turns out that he had taken the jacket off the dead Niki because he was cold. The family officially declares that the child is theirs in order to avoid deportation after all: The boy cannot be deported because adequate medical care cannot be guaranteed for him in Namibia. This also protects the Schneider family from deportation.
production
The film was produced by Degeto Film , WDR and Hager Moss Film for Das Erste on behalf of ARD .
reception
criticism
Thomas Gehringer from tittelbach.tv praised the fact that the film wanted to “awaken empathy on the one hand, and remind us of the fragility of the political situation on the other”. “Above all, being at the mercy” becomes clear. The change of perspective has "the interesting and positive effect that Africans here are not the needy", "but the rescuers themselves - and also the merciless smugglers, meticulous bureaucrats or friendly refugee helpers". He criticizes that the presentation is "so closely copied from current reality that the pedagogical intention is easy to recognize".
René Martens criticizes the time when filmmakers prevented viewers from actually developing empathy for the fictional refugee family by “giving their characters the conventional TV drama language corset” and thus belittling the experiences of real refugees of our time.
Heike Hupertz from the FAZ criticizes that the Aurors were basically "hardly interested in the political foundations of their terrifying vision". Since the work “primarily wants to make the escape itself emotionally comprehensible”, the specific causes of escape “within the logic of the film” are almost irrelevant.
It is easy to imagine that those responsible had consciously taken into account the controversy that the film sparked on social networks . The comments there ranged "from 'simple-minded propaganda ' to sarcastic appreciation of the stations ' historical awareness to cautious praise ."
In contrast to what Bild.de claims, the actual scandal is not some alleged racism, but an end in which the previous horrors are transformed into a cautious, yet emotionally optimistic end with family reunification.
Anne Haeming at Spiegel Online considered the film, which elegantly touches on all those scenarios “that most viewers should only know from hearsay”, as overdue. Even if the story tries to accommodate too many fates, "and that is precisely why it does not seem to be told in the end", the trick with the change of perspective works: "The historical, geographical or cultural distance that keeps escape stories so pleasant for the viewer", missing, because here he is sitting in the boat.
The fact finder from tagesschau.de reported on a concerted action by the right-wing extremist Reconquista Germanica to influence the discussion about the film in the social networks en masse and in a targeted manner.
Audience rating
The film was broadcast in prime time in Germany and was seen by 3.08 million people. It came fourth with a market share of 9.5%.
References
- Departure into the unknown in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- Departure into the unknown at filmportal.de
Individual evidence
- ↑ Festival films . Hof International Film Festival , 2017, accessed on February 7, 2018 .
- ^ Company credits. IMDb , accessed February 21, 2018 .
- ↑ Thomas Gehringer: TV film "Aufbruch ins Ungewisse". tittelbach.tv , accessed on February 7, 2018 .
- ^ René Martens: Boat refugees from Germany. Die Zeit , February 14, 2018, accessed on February 15, 2018 .
- ↑ Heike Hupertz: Europe is no longer safe. Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung , February 14, 2018, accessed on February 21, 2018 .
- ^ Anne Haeming: Germany, the unsafe country of origin. Spiegel Online , February 14, 2018, accessed February 21, 2018 .
- ↑ Patrick Gensing : info war by all means. tagesschau.de , February 13, 2018, accessed on February 14, 2018 .
- ↑ Manuel Weis: Primetime check. In: quotenmeter.de . February 15, 2018, accessed February 15, 2018 .
- ↑ Audience ratings and market shares of German television stations. In: ARD . February 15, 2018, archived from the original on February 15, 2018 ; accessed on February 15, 2018 .
- ↑ Despite live football: “The Bachelor” remains stable. In: quotenmeter.de. February 15, 2018, accessed February 16, 2018 .