Goethe-Kino (Online - Only Available in the UK)
Rabiye Kurnaz leaves no stone unturned to get her son released and takes her fight as far as the US Supreme Court. Andreas Dresen tells the real-life story of long-term Guantánamo detainee Murat Kurnaz from the point of view of the mother and does so with lots of humour and a fantastic female lead.
If anyone ever was in the wrong place at the wrong time, it was Murat Kurnaz. Shortly after the attack on the World Trade Center on 11 September 2001, the German-born Turkish nineteen-year-old travelled to Pakistan. Having previously turned more towards Islam, he was keen to experience a life based on the Qur'an there. He attended several Islamic schools before he was arrested by the Pakistani police in mid-November 2001. From Pakistan he was taken to Kandahar in Afghanistan by US soldiers and by January 2002 he was a prisoner in Guantánamo Bay in Cuba, from where his family received their first letter from him in March 2002. He spent four years and eight months in captivity, was tortured and witnessed the abuse of others without ever being charged or convicted. He was released on 24 August 2006 and returned to Germany.
The long legal road to his release, via including Turkey and the USA and the American Supreme Court, is what Andreas Dresen's film is about. This could make for a dry film, but the director tells the story from the perspective of Rabiye Kurnaz, Murat's resolute mother, a housewife and mother from Bremen who only wants one thing - to save her son. She is played with a lot of warmth and humour by the German-Turkish author, comedian, and presenter Meltem Kaptan, who won the Silver Bear for Best Actress in a Leading Role at the 2022 Berlinale. Fighting alongside Rabiye is the rather reserved human rights lawyer Bernhard Docke - an unlikely comic pair, that has to stick together for years. Despite all its humour, the film never lets us forget the injustice of what happened to Murat. Among other things, German authorities long refused to act on his behalf because he was not a German citizen. As of January 2024, there were still 30 prisoners in Guantánamo that has now been open for 22 years.
Germany / France 2022, colour, 119 min. with English subtitles.
Directed by Andreas Dresen. With Meltem Kaptan, Alexander Scheer, Charly Hübner, Nazmi Kirik, Sevda Polat, Abdullah Emre Öztürk, Şafak Şengül, Jeanette Spassova, Abak Safaei-Rad, Alexander Hörbe.
Please note that this online screening is only available in the UK.
Born in Gera, Germany in 1963, Andreas Dresen gained his first practical film experience as an assistant director at DEFA. He subsequently studied directing at the University of Film & Television “Konrad Wolf” in Potsdam-Babelsberg and, since 1992, has been a writer and director of film, theatre and opera. His film Grill Point (Halbe Treppe) was a worldwide success and won awards including the Silver Bear at the 2002 Berlinale. In 2011, Stopped on Track (Halt auf Halber Strecke) won the “Un Certain Regard” award at Cannes. Gundermann was released in cinemas in 2018 and won six German Film Awards including Best Film. Rabiye Kurnaz vs. George W. Bush had its world premiere at the 2022 Berlinale, where it won two Silver Bears, and went on to win three German Film Awards in the same year. At the Berlinale 2024 he presented his latest film From Hilde, With Love (In Liebe, Eure Hilde), his fifth film to screen in the Berlinale Competition. (Source: Berlinale)
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