THOSE WHO JUMP

"A riveting form of home movie where home itself is entirely off limits, Those Who Jump offers viewers a raw glimpse into the lives of African migrants hoping to make it into Europe." – Hollywood Reporter

Malian Abou Bakar Sidibé has lived on Morocco's Mount Gurugú for a year, gazing at the Spanish enclave of Melilla over the wall that separates Africa and the European Union. Like many, he dreams of a better life, but the odds are against him: even if he can scale the razor-wire fences, there's no assurance that Europe will provide him with that better life. But that won't stop him trying.

From the producers of the Oscar-winning documentary The Look of Silence (MIFF 2015), Those Who Jump has a perspective like no other. Documentarians Moritz Siebert and Estephan Wagner realised that no one was better suited to depict the refugee experience than a refugee, and gave a camera to Sidibé. As he teaches himself the skills of cinematography and storytelling, the camera becomes not just a tool of documentation but one of power that allows Sidibé to reclaim his individuality.

"In its wholly novel account of a geographical border's dangerous transgression, it renders certain filmmaking boundaries not transgressed, stretched, or bent, but utterly moot." – Film Comment

Screens with Kwassa Kwassa.