25/01/2013 - Five Years, an international premiere at the International Film Festival Rotterdam, recounts the days in Guantanamo prison of a German-Turkish man

The International Film Festival Rotterdam got underway on Wednesday in the port town in the Netherlands with the world premiere of Tiger competition title The Resurrection of a Bastard [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Guidovan Driel
film profile]. One of the many international premieres at the festival is Five Years [+see also:
trailer
film profile], the directorial debut of German director Stefan Schaller.

The film, based on true events, portrays the 1,725 days of imprisonment of German-Turkish national Murat Kurnaz, played by actor Sascha Alexander Geršak, in Guantanamo prison after he’s apprehended by American forces in Afghanistan, or perhaps Pakistan, as the film suggests.

Five Years portrays the familiar sights of Guantanamo: the orange prisoner suits; the hooded prisoners; the isolation cells with loud American music and extreme heat or cold piped in for extreme discomfort; the random beatings and endless interrogations.

The film, also written by Schaller, essentially plays out like a duel between the initially silent but very resilient Kurnaz and his interrogator, played by U.S. actor Ben Miles (Ninja Assassin, Speed Racer), who employs all the interrogation techniques at his disposal to try and get a confession out of Murat that might not be there to begin with.

The central paradox of the film, and indeed Guantanamo prison, is that only a confession would justify the torture methods employed.

Competently assembled, the film nonetheless lacks the visceral impact of the very similar The Road to Guantanamo [+see also:
trailer
film profile] from Michael Winterbottom and Mat Whitecross, and the film’s credibility is not aided by the fact many of the supporting American roles aren’t played by U.S. actors.

The film will be distributed in Germany by Zorro Film and was produced by Fabian Maubach for TeamWorx and Joseph M’Barek for Filmakademie Baden-Wurttemberg. Studio Babelsberg and Cine Plus co-produced the film, which was also backed by HR, Arte, SWR, SR and Radio Bremen.