Synopsis

About 40,000 refugees, including families with children, live sometimes about more than ten years in camps throughout Germany, usually very isolated in poor living conditions. The children of these families are often born in Germany but not granted German nationality, rather the nationality of their parents. They are only tolerated in their own “homeland” and can be deported at any time. They are born in a country which would rather get rid of them. Filmed in luminous black and white, a compelling documentary about refugee children in a German province focused entirely on the way these children see things and how it feels to be a refugee caught between worlds.

Festivals & Awards

63 Berlinale – Generation, 2013
Winner- Open Eyes Jury Award, Nuremberg International Human Rights Film Festival, 2013
Best Documentary Emergence Feature – Oaxaca FilmFest, Mexico, 2013

Director’s Statements

“About 40,000 refugees, including families with children, live sometimes about more than ten years in camps throughout Germany, usually very isolated in poor living conditions.
The children of these families are often born in Germany but not granted German nationality, rather the nationality of their parents. They are only tolerated in their own “homeland” and can be deported at any time. They are born in a country which would rather get rid of them.
“Half-day” integrated at school and isolated from the outside world at home in the camp, they grow up in a state of limbo. Their perspective is uncertain. The only hope is to get the residence permit – the permission to move out of the camp at last. Where do the children belong? Why should they be deported by law from their home? What does it mean to grow up in social isolation? What does the future hold for the children?”
– Anne Kodura

Director’s Bio

Born in 1987 in Halle (Saale), Germany. In 2010, ANNE KODURA directed her first theatre piece Orangenhaut written by Maja Pelevic for the Theatre Festival for New Drama in Munich. Studies of media art at the Academy of Fine Arts in Munich and first experiences directing shorts and experimental films. She is a graduate of the Talent Pool Program TP2 founded by Tradewind Pictures and supported by the Central German Media Fund. Currently she develops her first feature-length fiction as a director and screenwriter. Her first feature documentary Wasteland – So That No One Becomes Aware Of It was produced by her own production company DIE ZONE # Filmproduktion, which was founded together with cinematographer Friede Clausz in 2012.

Links

http://www.oedland-film.de
https://www.facebook.com/oedland