Film Forum

Winner of the Special Jury Prize at the 2023 Venice Film Festival, GREEN BORDER immediately drew controversy from the Polish government for its depiction of the European migrant crisis on the Poland-Belarus border. Shot in stark black-and-white, this riveting thriller explores the intractable conflict from multiple perspectives: a Syrian family fleeing ISIS caught between cruel border guards in both countries; young guards instructed to brutally reject the migrants; and activists who, at great risk, aid the refugees. Holland (EUROPA EUROPA) brings an unflinching eye and deep compassion to this blistering critique of a humanitarian calamity that continues to unfold.

2023     152 MIN.     POLAND / FRANCE / CZECH REPUBLIC / BELGIUM     KINO LORBER
IN POLISH, ARABIC, ENGLISH & FRENCH WITH ENGLISH SUBTITLES

Agnieszka Holland is the subject of a retrospective at Museum of the Moving Image, June 7–21:
https://movingimage.org/series/holland/

Reviews

“SEARINGLY POWERFUL. Scene by scene, GREEN BORDER is a work of devastating intelligence, striking visual clarity, and extraordinarily propulsive anger. Despite a weighty two-and-a-half hour running time, the picture barrels forward at breakneck speed; the sheer agility of Holland’s filmmaking becomes a direct expression of her empathy…Holland’s great cinematic subject is the mix of courage, fear, instinct, calculation, and sheer dumb luck it takes to survive an authoritarian regime, let alone defy it. What makes her a brilliant political artist is her willingness to confront that subject head on, without shying away from dark ironies or disquieting moral complexities.”
– Justin Chang, The New Yorker
Read full review.

“EXTRAORDINARY. A QUIET MASTERSTROKE…POISED TO BE ONE OF THE BEST FILMS OF THE YEAR. Holland’s film, though at times tough to watch, is so beautifully made, and so attuned to all the things we respond to as humans who care about art’s entwinement with real life, that it’s ultimately more joyful than dispiriting…it’s likely to leave you feeling emboldened and galvanized…Blends compassion with artistry so purely that there’s no way to separate them. This is bold filmmaking that makes us feel more courageous too. And there’s not a citizen of the world who couldn’t use some of that right now.”
– Stephanie Zacharek, TIME
Read full review.

“Bruisingly powerful... wraps its social critique in the razor wire of punchy, intelligent cinematic craft.”
– Jessica Kiang, Variety

“The strongest movie this critic has seen all year. [It] packs a real emotional wallop. It's the crowning achievement of filmmaker Agnieszka Holland, the 75-year-old Polish emigrate who's built a long, varied career telling political stories about everything from the Holocaust and Soviet tyranny to the drug war streets of Baltimore on The Wire.”
– John Powers, NPR

“ESSENTIAL VIEWING. All Holland asks here is that viewers contemplate this headline-generating tragedy happening ‘over there’ from the point of view of those within it. After you’ve sat through this devastating film, it’s impossible not to.”
– David Fear, Rolling Stone

CRITIC’S PICK. “The fury that radiates off Agnieszka Holland’s GREEN BORDER is so intense that you can almost feel it encasing you in its heat. A brutal, deeply affecting drama set against the migrant crisis in Europe, it is the latest from this great Polish director…”
– Manohla Dargis, The New York Times

“Profoundly moving, flawlessly executed.”
– Leslie Felperin, The Hollywood Reporter

“A stunning, harrowing film. [This] devastating refugee epic reverberates with deep empathy and quiet fury.”
– Phil de Semlyen, Time Out

“Shot in black and white and inflected at various points with subjective nightmare imagery (Holland has said that everything in the film has been carefully researched and fact checked)… Holland is not merely depicting a wide range of attitudes and behaviors around the migrant crisis: She is showing us a politically effective and humane way to act. What is most extraordinary about the film is that it insists on hope—not out of sentimentality but as a discipline. Generous as that action is, GREEN BORDER lays bare, with heartrending clarity, how solidarity is shaped along lines of race...”
– Amy Taubin, Artforum