Please note: This was screened in July 2017
"If Lars von trier were to make a documentary about the current immigration crisis in Europe it might very well turn out like Stranger in Paradise."
– Damon Wise, Variety.
One of the most talked about films of the year, this highly provocative documentary sees an actor posing as a teacher to question real life migrants and asylum seekers in order to explain the European view of the refugee crisis.
In a classroom in Sicily, just inside the walls of Fortress Europe, recently arrived refugees receive lessons on the starkly relevant topic of mass global immigration from a seemingly unbalanced teacher. The teacher, however, is an actor who receives three separate groups of real life migrants, each time adopting a different attitude: dismissive in the first part, full of empathy and goodwill in the second, and representational of actual European immigration policy, with all its complex rules in the last. The alternation between right-wing conservative, humanist and genuine 'realpolitik' approaches as to whether the migrants in his class can expect to find a new home in our part of the world or not, shows starkly where the refugees’ dreams clash with reality.
Forcing audiences to think hard about their own position, this thought-provoking and challenging film is guaranteed to cause much debate and provide a new perspective on one of our times' greatest crises. A brutally direct lesson in the realities of European refugee politics, it's not to be missed.
Crossings: Stories of Migration is an Institute of Contemporary Arts-led UK-wide film and events programme supported by the BFI using National Lottery funding and in partnership with the Goethe-Institut.
