Documentary about young underage asylum seekers in the Netherlands. Youngsters with a hidden past and an insecure future, who suddenly turn up in our daily lives and disappear again virtually unnoticed, while we have hardly any idea what their 'state of being' is. The documentary was inspired by a project executed at schools, in which these adolescents made a small wooden box that was painted and plastered, sometimes with photographs or small objects, containing their dearest memories phrased in a personal poem in Dutch. Because the film takes the poems as its starting point, it offers spectators a direct peek into the youngsters' 'inner world'. The contrast between on the one hand their daily reality and on the other their memories of a life they have already lived, put down in their poems in a 'new language', is often poignant and unchildlike. Thus, the position of uprooted teenagers is unexpectedly and unusually elucidated and the word that is on everybody's lips nowadays: 'naturalisation', attains a touching, unforeseen dimension.
other prizes
NL - Hilversum SCENECS Film Festival Best documentary
