THE ONE WHO CROSSED THE SEA
DIRECTED BY JONAS RIEMER
GERMANY // 2020
11 MINS
A refugee from east Germany crosses the Baltic Sea in a folding boat. Years later he finds a new home in a burgeoning nationalist movement.
Reflective Encounters
“There’s an exciting simplicity to Jonas Reimer’s film. His camera hangs above its subject, patiently following their perilous trip across foreign waters. It’s an artistic choice as minimal as it is unnerving; a story told with shots that move with the mechanical skill of surveillance drones. It’s an approach that draws out the tensions of each scene, especially the opening moments. The character’s process of escape plays like a thriller as they move anxiously from one vehicle to the next.
Always present is the sea, a dominating force in the frame. Opening with an image of surging water, the film turns the ocean into a somewhat abstract space: dark, glistening, and dangerous. Reimer lingers on this menacing image during a prolonged opening shot. The character’s sense of displacement is hardly relieved when eventually arriving on land. Despite the harshness of the subject matter, the short manages to conjure some visionary moments: a rescue boat hovering above traffic, or a sinking city fenced in with stone walls.
It’s to the director’s credit that his subject is never simplified. The protagonist is a contradictory character, a refugee whose stance on immigration becomes reactionary. Within this contradiction is the film’s most alarming message: that victims of oppression are encouraged to defend the system over their fellow comrades.”
— Chris Childs
Director’s Statement
The rise of nationalist tendencies, isolationist efforts and plain racism has become a mass phenomenon throughout Europe. The German history of the last century should have taught us a lesson in many ways. The nationalist and right-wing extremist currents in East Germany increasingly fill us with concern. Our generation, born at the time of the fall of communism, grew up knowing that it was living in a country that had done an exemplary job of cleaning up its own past.
But can we be sure of that when a quarter of the electorate once again votes for a party that allows fascists at the head of the party?
Perhaps more has been repressed than dealt with. We simply have to take note of this. For a long time we as a society have been with treating symptoms. Meanwhile, right-wing ideologues have had and continue to have all the time in the world to fuel the primal fear of foreigners. Where this fear comes from is the question at the heart of the film.
We don't want to give answers, but we want to draw attention to possible parallels. All people, no matter where they are in the world, are driven to where a better or more carefree life beckons. The story of THE CAME OVER THE SEA is anchored in reality and is as grotesque and contradictory for us as it is coherent. As filmmakers we have to ask ourselves what part we can contribute to the social discourse.
We think that we have to turn our attention back to the global context, because the preservation and protection of our own prosperity must never be carried out on the backs of the weak all over the world. With this film, we want to stimulate reflection and appeal to all our consciousness that we all long for a life in freedom and peace. for a life in freedom and peace.
Filmmaker Bio
Jonas Riemer was born near Berlin in 1990 and studied animation at the Film University Babelsberg. His short film MASCARPONE was screened at more than 100 festivals worldwide and won over 25 awards.
The film was part of the "Next Generation Short Tiger" at the Cannes Film Festival. In 2019 Jonas Riemer realized the animated documentary THE ONE WHO CROSSED THE SEA with a grant from Nordmedia.