Torn straight from the headlines, Michael Winterbottom's compelling and prescient In This World follows young Afghan (impressive newcomer Udin Torabi) and his older cousin Enayat (Enayatullah) as they embark on a hazardous overland trip from their refugee camp at Peshawar, north-west Pakistan. Entering Turkey on foot through a .. Read more
| Starring | Jamal Udin Torabi, Enayatullah, Imran Paracha |
|---|---|
| Director | Michael Winterbottom |
| Genres | Drama |
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Torn straight from the headlines, Michael Winterbottom's compelling and prescient In This World follows young Afghan (impressive newcomer Udin Torabi) and his older cousin Enayat (Enayatullah) as they embark on a hazardous overland trip from their refugee camp at Peshawar, north-west Pakistan. Entering Turkey on foot through a snowy, Kurdish-controlled pass, the pair again take their lives into their hands and face suffocation when they are locked in a freight container on a ship bound for Italy.
| Starring | Jamal Udin Torabi, Enayatullah, Imran Paracha |
|---|---|
| Director | Michael Winterbottom |
| Run time | DVD: 1 hr 28 mins |
| Certificate | |
| Genres | Drama |
| Language | Farsi |
| Subtitles | English |
| Released | DVD: 29 Sep 2003 Production year: 2002 |
| Format | DVD |
Director Michael Winterbottom's timely documentary-drama variation on the road movie won the Golden Bear at Berlin — as much for its humanity as its technical audacity and storyline. Shot on digital video and transferred to 35mm widescreen, this is an occasionally contrived exploration of the contentious and often overlapping issues of political asylum, economic migration and people-trafficking. En route from Afghanistan to London, the hardships of life for teenager Jamal Udin Torabi and his cousin Enayatullah, and for many of those they encounter on their journey, are arrestingly portrayed. The poverty, prejudice, exploitation, desperation and danger presented is sickeningly authentic; it's just a shame such brutal realism is compromised by a sentimental ending.
Shot on digital video, this falls somewhere between documentary and drama, recreating the experience of the vast journey by bus, car, and lorry with its monotony and sudden flurries of action, its uncertainties and dangers. It is an untidy movie, with no
Docu/drama crossover using refugee actors without a script and based on the desparate journeys made from Pakistan to Britain by refugees. Follows the two young men on the road and in their dealings with the people smuggling industry. Powerful stuff.
Is there any genre or subject that Michael Winterbottom cannot tackle successfully?! This film is a masterpiece of understatement, made all the more remarkable when you watch the "making -of" extra feature and realise how most of the footage was obtained. For anyone who has shown an interest in the current asylum debate that consumes Western democracies, and the UK in particular, Winterbottom has captured its essence by focusing on the stories of two men who are economic migrants from 20 years of war in Afghanistan. It will make you question most of your preconceptions about asylum seekers and economic refugees, and the thin line that in many cases separates both. Compelling viewing.
Michael Winterbottom directing Angelina Jolie in a movie produced by her beau, Brad Pitt? Has Britain's most prolific filmmaker finally sold out and gone Hollywood? Don't you believe it! Only a complete cynic would question the motives behind this gripping, honest movie about the disappearance of US journalist Daniel Pearl in Pakistan, January, 2002. The South Asia bureau chief for The Wall Street Journal, Pearl flew in to Islamabad, September 12, 2001. He would spend the next four months... Read more