'Green Border' Review: An Unvarnished Look at the Migration Crisis

The unfortunate souls who inhabit Polish director Agnieszka Holland's “Green Border” have little light in their eyes. A grim drama about the refugee crisis in Europe (a theme that has been explored in recent, equally magnificent Oscar-nominated films like “Flee” and “Io Capitano”), the film chronicles this labyrinthine tragedy from three disparate perspectives: that of one family of immigrants, that of a heterogeneous group of activists and a morally blind border guard.

And yet, their desperate expressions are the same. The point of these kinds of films is to put a human face on unimaginable tragedies, to put us in the shoes of society’s most vulnerable, but what’s most striking is how Holland extends that approach to everyone his camera captures, whether they’re the oppressors or the oppressed. To varying degrees, each character has been undone by this crisis; all of them are collateral damage at the mercy of something larger and more insidious that lies just out of sight.

Set in October 2021 on the border between Poland and Belarus (the border between democracy and dictatorship) and filmed in black and white, “Green Border” begins with a family of Syrian refugees, led by Father Bashir (Jalal Altawil) , on a flight that lands in Belarus. Three generations, tired but hopeful, will head to Poland with the ultimate goal of reuniting with a relative in Sweden. Another passenger, an older Afghan woman named Leila (Behi Djanati Atai), who, like them, is fleeing the war seeking refuge in the European Union, joins Bashir's family for companionship as she navigates what could be an arduous journey.

We quickly learn how arduous it is. After being picked up at the airport by a nondescript van, Bashir, Leila and the rest are detained at a security checkpoint in the middle of the wooded countryside. A sudden, distant gunshot sends them running toward a barbed-wire border fence, and the guards unceremoniously throw their luggage over the barrier as the van speeds away. Welcome to Poland, except that soon local authorities will violently force you to return to Belarus. No one wants these foreigners unless they can be bled financially, armed soldiers demanding bribes for necessities like water.

The film's second narrative thread revolves around Jan (Tomasz Włosok), a kindly Polish border guard who has been brainwashed by his superiors into assuming that all refugees are secret terrorists plotting to destroy Poland. (“One mistake,” Jan’s commander warns during a briefing, “and in six months we will have a bomb in the Warsaw subway.”) While Bashir and his children run for their lives, Jan is about to start a family with his young wife, trying not to feel worried about the plight of the foreigners he has managed to marginalize in his mind. .

Finally, Holland introduces us to Julia (Maja Ostaszewska), a widowed Polish psychiatrist who vows to dedicate herself to helping refugees find a safe path. However, her friends are not so willing to risk it: as a supposedly liberal Polish colleague tells her after refusing to lend Julia her truck, “What if they catch you and tie it up to me?” It is not just the callous border guards who have hardened their hearts.

Holland, a politically outspoken filmmaker who has plumbed the darkness of the Holocaust (“Europa Europa,” “In Darkness”), finds this modern humanitarian crisis equally deplorable. And the three-time Oscar nominee, who turned 75 in November, hasn't lost one bit of her anger or her willingness to provoke. “Green Border” condemns her country's abusive behavior toward immigrants. This resulted in the film being attacked before its Venice premiere by the right-wing Polish government, which recklessly and ridiculously compared it to Nazi propaganda.

Fortunately, some of those government officials were recently defeated at the polls, while “Green Border” remains unwavering: a brutal document about a seemingly hopeless situation. In fact, when idealistic Julia teams up with some experienced young activists, including pragmatic leader Marta (Monika Frajczyk), she discovers the realities of trying to make a difference. No matter the efforts of these good Samaritans, the refugees will drown in the swamps. Others are too heavy to carry to safety and constant border patrols make it almost impossible to escape detection. They can't rescue everyone. It's about choosing your battles, many of which you will lose.

In the different plot lines, the characters have a certain seriousness, underlined by the sober performances. Holland has cast actors who often share similarities with her roles: Altawil is a Syrian refugee, while Ostaszewska has helped migrants at the border. The script, co-written by Holland, is based on real incidents, although the film's meandering story lacks flashy moments or big speeches. Likewise, cinematographer Tomasz Naumiuk's handheld monochrome images are pristine but avoid self-conscious beauty.

Instead, what persists is a collective misery and the invisibly masterful choreography of chaos, rage and death. Unsurprisingly, those narrative threads occasionally intertwine, sometimes leading to overly neat dramatic ironies that work against the forceful impact of what otherwise unfolds. “Green Border” is most fascinating when it succumbs to the senselessness of the world it portrays, when the characters fight futilely against a global system of oppression and intolerance. If Altawil articulates Bashir's panic and fear, Włosok is equally adept at capturing Jan's gradual moral awakening: his complicity, which has guaranteed him a steady salary, becomes a spiritual cancer that devours him.

It is clear that not even an army of Julias is enough to repair the social rot. “Green Border” also examines the everyday cases of cowardice and fear that perpetuate this immigration crisis. He is the farmer who shows Leila kindness but then reports her to the police. She is the woman at the grocery store who is adamant that refugees deserve no compassion. It is casual intolerance and distrust disguised as national security.

Holland’s heart breaks when he thinks about Bashir and Leila, but he never reduces them to simplistic, pitiable figures. He points to the flashes of Jan’s developing conscience and his realisation that he is as disposable as the immigrants he is paid to dispatch. These atrocities continue and, as with Jan, Holland wants to challenge viewers to feel complicit because of our inaction.

“Why are you doing this to us?” At one point, a distraught Leila screams at the indifferent border guards. No one answers. Whether at the Polish border or one closer to our own, the silence is deafening and damning.