Hoppet

If you have Zozo, you can say that this is kind of like it, except that Zozo is a very serious and realistic movie, when this is more like a "feelgood" movie about a boy that want to be an athlete like Kajsa Bergkvist. He comes to Sweden, away from the war in his country, in the start it's very hard to live in the new country, but he's starting to grip the situation and gets a lot of friends and respect. I liked this movie, it was fun sometimes and the actors was good, and sometimes brilliant, especially the little boy(played by the infamous Ali Ali) and the hot dog-man(played by the wonderful actor Peter Stormare), but(and this is a big "but")the movie was far to short, and it did'not got the energy that a movie must have.

I cant give this one a zero, or by god I would carve it stone if I had to. Bad acting, worse story makes it one of the worst movies of 2006, if not THE worst. A plot that has been squeezed in every aspect to be entertaining but still thoughtful ends up doing nothing of them. It rather attempts to confirm regular stereotypes about Kurds (you know, misogynists, backward, patriarchal, leeches etc) and (probably in the name of equal political correctness) also about Swedes (characterless, shallow, stupid etc). Practically, the seeds of prejudice are grown in this movie for its young audience, subconsciously adjusting their minds. The script is lousy because its one-sided. Let me explain: the Kurds are speaking Swedish in Kurdish. The expressions and the dialogues are Swedish directly translated into Kurdish words, which by that sense makes the Kurdish part of the script very unprofessional and unrealistic. TO speak a language is not only about words translated, its about meaning and life. Its about soul to the text. What a failure this movie is in that matter, and it most definitely does not stop there. The illustration of the Kurdish society is utterly weak with no realistic reflections of it, domestically or in the diaspora. As a Swede of Kurdish heritage whom have been living in Sweden long enough to comprehend both societies I see no message in this movie but a failed attempt to do something good but in fact has ended up as something truly bad. A movie cannot live by momentary "glories" in the story: couple of wise cracks, few good lines. Petter Näss - what have you done?

I saw this at a local film festival (Discovery Film Festival at the DCA in Dundee, Scotland) and I thoroughly enjoyed it. The festival showed many foreign films, and this had to be one of the most enjoyable (my other favourite being Nocturna, a Spanish made animation) -and I didn't expect it to be very good to be honest. I thought the acting was very good, and I don't know much about the countries where they were, but I enjoyed the story line, and felt for the brothers-who were very convincing, especially the main boy. The hot dog seller was also a funny character. Personally, I just really enjoyed the film and would love to see it again. It's an easy watching film, with plenty of storyline and interesting characters (not annoying kids at all). Some people clearly expected different things from this film, like one previous reviewer. They obviously can't enjoy a light hearted film without finding faults.