Tussenland

Veteran documentarian Eugenie Jansen's remarkable first feature film, Tussenland, has rather arbitrarily been given the English title Sleeping Rough. On the surface, this is a touching tale of an encounter between a young Sudanese refugee in Holland and a lonely old man who finds the boy sleeping in his back yard. But the literal translation of the Dutch title as `intermediate land' or `between country, ' and attention to the director's framing device, provide an even richer, more emotive cinematic experience. Tussenland is framed by the voice-over narration of an African folk tale in which an orphaned boy leaves his grandfather's home and is adopted by the Sun in a far-off place. Majok, too, is an orphan who has left his beloved homeland. He now lives among strangers, yearning ceaselessly for his life in Sudan. Also in this `intermediate land' lives Jakob, an aged, cantankerous widower who has not seen his own son in 20 years. Jakob, veteran of the Dutch colonial wars in Indonesia, still harbors rancor against Holland for the treatment of its soldiers. He, too, lives among strangers in a country to which he feels no connection. Director Jansen, using a carefully paced, quasi-documentary style, skillfully reveals to us the aching, profound emotional isolation of the protagonists, as they wander in seemingly perpetual displacement. Ultimately, Jakob's tentative connection with Majok triggers a move towards reconciliation with his friends, his family, and his past. Majok, however, does not fare as well. The framing narration ends with the Sun allowing only the grieving grandfather to see the lost child once a day as he passes over the sky. Majok, like the lonely child in the tale, must remain far from home in exile, in Tussenland.

Tussenland was better than I expected it to be, it portrays the 'relationship' between and old, grumpy, Dutch man (Jakob) and a refugee from Soudan (Majok). The acting is so convincing it looks more like a documentary than a movie. John Kon Kelei, the boy who plays Majok is a refugee in real life, so maybe this movie is more 'real life' than a documentary or a movie anyway. If you like cultural movies, rather than mindless action-flicks, this is a movie you wouldn't want to miss for the world!

Compared with "Mapmaker" this movie points in the same direction yet form and importance of political conflict are different. Indeed, radical politics of nationalism/imperialism influences one man's life and behaviour, yet political socialization is placed in the background. Jakob, a lonesome and hostile Indonesian War veteran, quarrels with his neibourghs about their cat and about his share of the garden. Which is separated from kindergarten vis-a-vis by a massive fence with barb-wire. Directress Jansen attaches her the young refugee from the Sudan, Majok. She is his companion in misfortune. She's roamer, driven away. Like the cat, that comes round just before him at Jakob's, it is for Majok; the old guy chases him away. Little by little, he who has alienated from the people in his home country makes friends with the one alien to the people. Economical of expression, yet strong in presence, that's how the amateur actors model the departure away from isolation, the outset for a new understanding of each other. Jansen accompanies her actors with almost documentary patience and distance. When Jakob defiantly says in the end that the past was crap, then this contains a soft pleading, to do better in the present what could not be done better in the past. "Tussenland" was awarded by the oecumenical jury.

This film is a documentary-like movie (first fiction-movie from a documentarist director) about a refugee from Sudan and an old Dutch War veteran (Indonesian independence war). Their lives mix up during the movie and you slowly see a friendship evolve. The emotions of the characters are very well acted and this causes a very good situation to identify with the characters. In one line: a great movie!