previous page
TOC
Features
Unchained Memories Danish director Jonas Poher Rasmussen brings the turbulent life of an Afghan friend to animated life in the prize-winning feature, Flee. By Ramin Zahed
W
hen Danish filmmaker Jonas Poher Rasmussen was a teenager, he befriended a young Afghan refugee who had moved to his neighborhood. A couple of decades later, he finally got the chance to tell the story of his friend’s challenging life in the animated documentary Flee. The feature, which won the Grand Jury Prize: Documentary at Sundance earlier this year, has been praised for the way it uses the medium to tackle a difficult subject and cast a light on how early traumatic events can alter the way a victim recalls the past. “I had asked my friend to make a live-action documentary about his experiences for many years, but he kept saying no,” recalls the Danish filmmaker during a recent Zoom interview. “Finally, when I decided to tell his story as an animated documentary, he agreed to let me do it since animation offers a certain level of anonymity.” The film chronicles the harrowing life of “Amin”(a pseudonym), a gay Afghan refugee, who leaves his home to escape the mujahideen and the Taliban, only to be victimized by corrupt police in Russia before finding a new life in Denmark. The upcoming Neon release made head-
lines for attracting Riz Ahmed and Nikolaj Coster-Waldau as exec producers and voice actors for the English-language version. Produced by Final Cut for Real, Sun Creature Studio, Vivement Lundi!, Mostfilm, Mer Film and several other companies, the 89-minute film was written by Rasmussen and Amin. The film’s art director was Jess Nicholls, animation director was Kenneth Ladekjær and animation producer was Charlotte de La Gournerie.
Drawn to Reality The director first sketched out the outline for the movie at Anidox, a creative workshop
that brings together documentary and animation professionals to help them work on projects together. Production on the film, which was made for around $4 million, began about three years ago. The 2D animation was produced using TVPaint. “The animation was mainly produced in Denmark, but we had some people working remotely in France and Georgia. Overall, we had about 40 people working on the animation,” recalls Rasmussen. So, why did the live-action doc-maker decide to use animation to tell Amin’s story? “This is a story about memory and trauma, and truths that are buried in the past,” ex-
www.animationmagazine.net 18 june|july 21
TOC
previous page
