ZimmerFrei presents two episodes of the documentary film „Saga”.
„Saga” is a documentary film still in progress, shot in several episodes along three years in the town of Bologna in Italy. The protagonists of the film are three teenagers form Italy, Nigeria and Eritrea and a young boy as well from Eritrea. Bologna is the place they call home, their birthplace or their city of adoption. While they become of age and have the first experiences of living on their own, these young inhabitants are an example of the new citizens who will inherit the recent and the ancient past of a Middle Age city such as Bologna and will contribute to determine its future. „Saga” is not a film on migration, its focus is rather on the concept of recognition, integration, cultural intersection and fundamental hospitality of the other as a different-similar, as suggested by a particular Italian term „noialtri”, meaning „we-the-others”.
„Saga 1: Walking”
The first episode revolves around Yakub and Tea. Tea is 16 years old, she was born in Bologna and has just returned from a trip around Europe. Yakub left Nigeria at the age of 16 and, was catapulted to Libya and landed in Italy at 17. Since Yakub arrived in Bologna he walks all day long because he feels more safe while he moves. Wherever he is, he always points towards the center. Sometimes he goes out for a stroll and then loses the thread. Now that he has just turned 18 years old his status has changed. It is the beginning of a new saga.
„Saga 2: Staying here”
Filmon is 22 years old and has been blind since the age of 11 due to the explosion of a mine while he was playing in a field in his village near Asmara, in Eritrea. He came to Italy for medical treatment and since then he has lived in Bologna. Filmon is a young intellectual, he is attending the University of Political Science and would like to become a diplomat or a professor.
Bana is 16 years old, attends high school, and lived in Bologna since she was four years old. Bana is blind too, she is smart and beautiful and she knows it.
The city around them is in full swing: aggressive territorial marketing, gentrification and low cost tourism. In the meanwhile Filmon, Bana and their friends question themselves on the everlasting fundamental things, on life, on the future. Filmon is waiting since three years for the conferral of the Italian citizenship and together with Bana looks forward that day to say at last: „I was born in one place, I build my life in another, I'm Bolognese of belly, Mediterranean by experience, European of vocation”.
Films in the project Atlas of Transitions. New geographies for a cross-cultural Europe.
Project is co-funded by the Creative Europe Programme of the European Union.