Fighting Through the Night

Greece – yesterday's headline – has all but disappeared from current affairs. Yet the precarious situation for the people in this country is as real as ever; the health system is teetering on the brink of collapse and the austerity measures have rendered people immobile. Sylvain L'Espérance's long-term observational film is a poetic, combative work; in it he observes: a revolt on the part of powerless cleaners, a group of dock workers analysing a new kind of fascism, the commitment of the doctors working in a clinic financed by donations, but also the despair of refugees who often find themselves in more precarious situations than those they sought to flee. These extreme conditions are stirring feelings of solidarity among the country's beleaguered under- and middle-classes who are now stepping up to defy the dehumanising lack of prospects. Sylvain L'Espérance grants us the kind of profound, compassionate insights which have long since disappeared from mainstream media. He is interested in the outsiders and the marginalised and their resistance against prevailing conditions. After making several films in Mali, he now turns his attentions to the heart of Europe. (Berlinale)