69 Minutes of 86 Days

Egil Håskjold Larsen : 2017

Slowly we glide over the remains of life-jackets, torn travel bags and discarded shoes at an unnamed shoreline, establishing the tense political framework of this story. From here we pass on to observe groups of fellow travellers, still continuously moving forward. In the midst of the crowd a three-year-old girl, Lean, catches our attention. She is sitting on the shoulders of her father, with a Frozen backpack on her own back. The father is wearing a hoodie, an Adidas backpack and Nike shoes. This is a family like our own; these people are just like our neighbours. The only, but huge, difference is that they have lost their home and are on their way to a new one – one with their relatives who live in Sweden. There are no interviews or voice-overs; the filmmaker follows the family, which also includes Lean's mother and sister as well as her uncles, as they wait at the Macedonian border, then get into a car driven by a Serbian, walk through Hungarian fields, get on a train in Austria, and then board a bus in Germany. But these locations are not identified with narrative titles – the viewer can determine their geographical position only by means of road signs, railway station instructions or the language spoken in some of the scenes. Carefully we are getting into Lean's journey, and we get to know her outstanding character as she slowly makes her way through Europe with her family. She is strong, never cries and seems to grasp the seriousness of these circumstances. This film tells the story about childhood, family relations, hope and a world that is difficult to understand. Egil Håskjold Larsen's documentary, his first feature, premiered at Copenhagen International Documentary Festival 2017.

69 Minutes of 86 Days – trailer (vimeo)