For many years, Amin was unable to speak about the experience of his flight. It is only now that he finds the courage to open up to his schoolmate, filmmaker Jonas Poher Rasmussen. From earliest childhood Amin’s life was marked by political unrest in his native country of Afghanistan and soon by growing up without a permanent home. His painful memories are visualized in haunting animations, interwoven with documentary footage.

It’s a well-known fact that flight does not lead from point A to point B and then simply ends. Amin’s story, though, shows how rocky and tortuous it can really be, leading from Afghanistan via Russia, Estonia and a few other stations to Denmark. Only when his life is on a safe track with an upcoming wedding and a good career does he find the strength to talk about what he had to go through to be where he is today. In an almost psychoanalytical setting, the protagonist – lying down – talks about his past. The narrative moves in a spiral between then and now, allowing for frequent respites between the traumatic impressions that the poignant animation makes almost physically tangible. It’s no coincidence that “Flee” has already won multiple awards and is considered an “instant classic” even now.

Twelve-year-old Mikal lives with his father Jason, mother Tonya and cat Smokey in cramped conditions in a run-down hotel room. So-called “flophouses” offer accommodation to all those who cannot escape the radical inequality of the US real estate market and are forced to lead their lives on the margins of society. The few square metres serve as bedroom, living room and kitchen, dishes are done in the bathtub. Nothing but a thin curtain separates Mikal’s “realm” from his parents’ bed, and the only escapes from the confines of his home are the lonely hotel corridors and the vending machine in the lobby. But their family life is put to the test not only by the precarious living conditions but also by his mother’s alcohol abuse.
Despite these difficult circumstances, moments of love, affection and dreaming shine through. It seems almost harmonious when, after a fierce argument, father and son kneel in front of the bathtub, washing a mountain of dishes and jokingly adopting the language of commands in a canteen kitchen. In her three-year observation, director Monica Strømdahl captures such ambivalences in fragile and intimate images whose immediacy is always palpable.