Green Border: the shocking film by Agnieszka Holland (review)

The Polish filmmaker tackles the migration issue in a gripping film, multiplying points of view, obviously committed but rich in nuances.

Along with the Mediterranean, the border between Belarus and Poland constitutes the other European gateway for those fleeing poverty and war in their countries in search of an El Dorado. And it is this zone of total lawlessness that Agnieszka Holland has decided to tell with her new film, rewarded at the Mostra and reviled in her country where the far-right Polish Minister of Justice compared it to Nazi propaganda. A reaction which says a lot about the shock caused by the discovery of this 2h30 fresco. An obviously committed work but without falling into Manichaean ease. The first hour is knockout. It follows a Syrian family trying to reach Sweden illegally, confronted by Polish soldiers who treat them worse than animals (the scene where these soldiers and their Belarusian counterparts throw them on either side of barbed wire on which some impalent is unbearable).

Then Holland will zoom out, multiply the points of view, also showing the Poles who provide support to these suffering populations, including soldiers doubting the speech of their leaders presenting them as terrorist suicide bombers. In doing so, she brings nuance to this question, which is often treated in a binary manner, but without fading behind it. The proof with its black and white production bias which matches Garrone’s desire with Me, captain to make cinema against all odds, while thereby putting distance between the spectator and raw violence and thus avoiding any sensationalism.

By Agnieszka Holland. With Jalal Altawil, Maja Ostaszewska, Tomas Wlosok… Duration 2h27. Released February 7, 2024