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Password: Fajara

Spain, France | 2017 | Documentary Film | 17 min. | Arabic, English, French | English subtitles | World Premiere DOK Leipzig 2017

Password: Fajara (OST) is the third reference of the label OPENTHENEXT.

The vinyl collector’s version is limited to 50 numbered copies. The cover is 300gr black cardboard decorated with handmade printed artwork.

Released by:
openthenext.org
EP release date:
19 November 2019

Password: Fajara

Watch on Filmin

Synopsis

Abstract phantoms of trucks cross the screen. Infrared images. This is where refugees are waiting in the hope of reaching UK through the Eurotunnel. “Fajara” is the Arab word for explosion. But in the Jungle it was a word for: getting through, making it to the other side, arriving. The images become abstract, semantics dissolve. A haunting film about the phantoms of meaning (of words).

Credits

Director: Séverine Sajous, Patricia Sánchez Mora
Concept by: Séverine Sajous
Producer: Patricia Sánchez Mora, Séverine Sajous
Cinematographer: Séverine Sajous
Editor: Patricia Sánchez Mora
Animation: Óscar Santamaria
Sound: Séverine Sajous & J.Ignasio Canosa
Music & Sound designer: Chris Blakey
Script: Séverine Sajous, Patricia Sánchez


Film Premieres

International Premiere
2017. Dok Leipzig. International Leipzig Festival for Documentary and Animated Film, International Competition Short Film, Germany
National Premiere
2017. Festival Internacional de Cortometrajes de Aguilar de Campoo, Women Documentary Section, Spain
Local Premiere
2018. Mostra Internacional de Films de Dones de Barcelona, Official Section, Spain

Awards

2019. Awarded at the category Audience Prize at the Festival International de Cinema Etnográfico do Museo do Pobo Galego, Spain
2019. Awarded First Prize at the category multimedia at the POY LATAM, Columbia
2018. Awarded at the category Best National Documentary Short Movie in “Piélagos en corto” International Short Movie Festival, Spain

Official Selections

2018. l’Alternativa, Festival Internacional de Cinema Independent de Barcelona, Hall Selecciona I, Spain
2018. Festival Internacional de Cine Invisible “Film Sozialak” I Hall Selecciona, Spain
2018. Astra Film Festival I International Competition Short Film, Romania
2018. Vancouver International Film Festival International Competition Short Film, Canada
2018. Alcances Cádiz. Festival de Cine Documental, International Competition Short Film, Spain
2018. Mostra Internacional Films de Dones, Official Section, Spain
2018. Busan International Short Film Festival, International Competition, Korea
2018. Cairo International Women’s Film Festival, International Competition Short Film, Egypt

Reviews

Cortosfera: Cortosfera: Mujeres en Calais: cruzar la línea
Cortosfera: Cortosfera: Alcances 2018

  • Password: Fajara describes the moments of risk at night, of hiding and waiting, of attempts to pass and of some successful ones. The movie have been made possible thanks to the complicity between the immigrants and the photographer, after the latter lived six months in the “jungle” and developed a photo workshop for a group of them, a project called “Jungleye”.

  • The images have been taken with an infrared camera for hunt. The aesthetic given reminds one of  “surveillance” images but this time the camera instead of being watchman is accomplice. This time it become allies with the ones building “dougar”, with the ones doing “Fajara” to keep an eye on “Abbas”, the police in the jargon of the “Jungle”.