Ai Weiwei at Venice Festival; Iranian Refugees Turned Away from the Camera

Ai Weiwei, the Chinese artist, is well-known and has often been referred to as one of the most recognized figures in visual arts. Now, he is presenting his first feature film at the 74th Venice International Film Festival in the competition section, and it seems he will win one of the main awards. The documentary titled 'Human Flow' focuses on the issues of migration and asylum. Ai Weiwei has long visited various refugee camps around the world, trying to depict their painful conditions in different corners of the globe. He has often waited on the shores of Italy and Greece for boats bringing refugees across the sea to Europe, which has become one of today's most controversial problems in Europe. The film begins with beautiful images of the Mediterranean Sea and quickly gets to the core issue: the humanitarian situation of refugees primarily from Syria, Iraq, and Afghanistan fleeing war. The film pauses at moments to observe the human flow, for instance, moving toward the Macedonian border in Greece in search of a safe haven, hoping to find a way to Germany from there. However, it also captures some of their most private moments; including an Iranian girl who speaks with her back to the camera about herself and her state of uncertainty (and the fact that there is no one to guide them), and suddenly breaks down in tears (Ai Weiwei attempts to calm her in this scene). The second Iranian we see in the film recounts his story of fleeing the border and residing in Turkey, mentioning that some refugee girls were assaulted along the way, and since the traffickers were armed, there was nothing they could do. Strangely, all refugees from various countries appear easily in front of the camera, but both Iranians present in the film are turned away from it, likely out of fear of Iranian security forces, unwilling to appear on camera. This highlights a bitter point that Iranian refugees in camps, in addition to numerous other problems, do not feel safe. However, apart from some special framing (which reflects Ai Weiwei's experiences in visual arts), his perspective is strangely journalistic. Resorting to newspaper headlines and media in various sections to provide information to the audience stems from this perspective, as do some scenes—and mid-film writings—that become unnecessarily sloganistic; including scenes related to Palestinians. On the other hand, Ai Weiwei's presence in various scenes seems superfluous and could easily be removed from the film. Yet, the film's strength lies in the filmmaker's fearless exploration of parts of the world that can be very dangerous; including scenes from the war with ISIS and the capture of cities, which speaks to the filmmaker's courage. He visits various camps around the world; from Bangladesh to Kenya, where there is surprisingly a lesser-known camp that is the largest refugee camp in the world: housing five hundred thousand refugees! The harsh realities the filmmaker highlights can disturb the viewer's peace; from the simple point that at the time of the fall of the Berlin Wall, there were only eleven walls between countries, and by 2016, there were seventy walls (or something similar), to the point that Africa's population will double by 2050 without any facilities for them. The filmmaker also reaches the Mexico-U.S. border and captures several people jumping over the wall; where Donald Trump promised to build a bigger wall. The film's final dialogue is a beautiful humorous line from a former Syrian astronaut: 'From up there, seeing the Earth, I thought this beautiful planet was for all of us. Of course, this beautiful planet has its villains, so why not gather them all and send them into space?'