1990 Winner, Journey of Hope

Journey of Hope

Director:  Xavier Koller

Distributed by:  Miramax

Released:  August 1990

Country:  Switzerland

A 20^th century poet once opined, “It’s no fun being an illegal alien.”  Truer words were never spoken for Haydar, a sheep farmer from rural Turkey.  Sure Haydar has a loving wife, a gaggle of fun children, a supportive extended family, and a never-ending supply of lamb chops.  But he gets a postcard from his brother in Switzerland that says something like, “Having a lovely time sucking down hot chocolate and listening to that Ricola dude yodeling in my back yard.  Hope to see ya soon on the ski slopes!”  (that’s a rough translation)  This postcard enchants Haydar, and soon his mind is made up--he's off to Switzerland.

I’m no whiz in geography, but it would seem to me that it isn’t all that easy to get from Turkey

Haydar and Mehmet Ali reading the postcard

to Switzerland without a passport.  Switzerland doesn’t have a huge wall at its border (or didn’t in this movie—how the heck should I know?) but it does have a little thing called the Alps!  Haydar may have watched the Von Trapps saunter through the mountains to escape the Nazis, but he will soon find that this isn’t the movies.  Well, it is the movies, but you know what I mean.

Haydar can’t afford to take the whole family—he will have to grease a few officials along the way and sell everything he has just to get himself and his wife out of there.  He decides to take one of the kids with him because kids adapt so well to new things.  At the beginning of the film, all Haydar’s kids had a group dare, the stunt being to lie on the train tracks while a train passes over

REEE-CO-LAAAH!

them.  All be but one chickened out before the train got there—all but little Mehmet Ali, a cute 7-year-old boy.  Watching the kid who plays Mehmet Ali was probably the most enjoyable part of this film for me.  He’s one of those kids who pisses a parent off by ignoring what he’s told to do, but Mom or Dad can’t stay mad because you cannot help but like his pluck and good nature.  Mehmet Ali wins over everyone he comes in contact with, including a crusty old trucker who helps the threesome get toward their destination.  There is one scene in particular—toward the end of the film, when the family is struggling in the cold mountains, when Mehmet Ali is cold and scared and you can’t help but worry about the little fella.

One thing I struggled with was why on earth Haydar got it into his Turkish skull that he had to move to Switzerland in the first place.  Sure, his dopey brother painted a pretty picture for him, but he really didn’t seem to have it all that bad in Turkey.  I mean, it’s not like he lived in Detroit.  He was willing to sacrifice everything to get to his Shangri-La, and I don’t want to give away the ending, but sometimes you have to realize the grass isn’t always greener on the other side of the mountains. 

Crossing the Alps in the movies

The Title:  Also known as Reise der Hoffnung in German and Umuda yolculuk in Turkish.  I’m not sure those are direct translations, but they can’t be worse than Journey of Hope as a title.

The Culture:  What I got out of it is that if they can, Turks will do anything to get out of their country, and there are plenty of crooks willing to take their money to help them do it.

 

Crossing the Alps in this movie

Agenda Danger:  I GUESS if you are obsessed with illegal immigration, you might find fault with how sympathetic Haydar and his family are seen.  But only if you are like Ann Coulter-crazy.

Best Picture that year:   Dances With Wolves

Rating:  It was nothing downright special, but I admit to having rooted for this family, or at least to see something go right for them.  This cost me $2 on Amazon to watch it and it was worth every penny.

1991 Winner, Mediterraneo

Mediterraneo

Director:  Gabriele Salvatores

Distributed by:  Miramax Films

Released:  January 1991

Country:  Italy

When I was 12 or so, in the late 70’s, I won First Prize in a local archery contest.  It was a summer day-camp thing, and I represented my school camp in the contest, facing all opposition from the several other school camps in the area.  As reward, they gave me a gift certificate for a sundae at Dairy Queen.  Going into the contest, I was skeptical I would do very well—I knew how to hold the bow and sometimes was even able to hit the target.  But surprisingly, I was able to bring home The Banana Split because when it came time for the big match, it turned out the only other competitor was an 8-year-old kid who had never tried archery before.  I beat him so bad I bet he went home crying for his mommy.  

I haven’t seen any of the other entries for Best Foreign Film in 1991, but my guess is they were not unlike that 8-year-old boy.  Because the winner, Mediterrano, is about as good a movie as I was an archer.

The Italian sailors.  They're zany screw ups.

The film is about a group of screw-up Italian sailors during early World War II.  Their ship gets sunk and they end up on a Greek island that is seemingly abandoned.  They lose radio contact and are stuck in this beautiful little town in the Mediterranean Sea.  The guys search the island and gradually find that the town is not at all abandoned after all, but with most of the men of fighting age off to war, the the residents had all just been hiding out.  The sailors aren’t really sure what more they can do but hang tight and wait for help. 

 

Unlike Gilligan’s group or Tom Hanks in Castaway, the Italian sailors don’t see the urgency of getting rescued.  The townspeople are welcoming, and after a while, most of the Italians like the idea of just staying put rather than fighting again for Mussolini.  There is a church in need of repair, kids that need soccer coaches, and most importantly, pretty single women needing attention, including a prostitute with a heart of gold.  The question is, what will they do when they learn Italy is no longer fighting the Allies?  Will they stay or go back to the land where they belong?

War or sex-starved Greek girls:  Which will they choose?

Mediterreano is technically an anti-war film, pointing to the fact that sitting around having Greek food and Greek women is a whole hell of a lot more fun than shooting at people and getting shot at.  Profound stuff.  The characters were supposed to be comical/zany, I suppose, but I found them all to be a bore.  The movie ends with an unnecessary flash forward to see what our chums are up to many years later, but by that time, I was completely uninterested in them.  If the movie was trying to make some point about the futility of war, it missed the mark way worse than my 8-year-old archery opponent did.

The Title:  The Italians took the word “Mediterranean,” as in the Mediterranean Sea, and Italian-ized it by taking the “an” off and adding an “o” at the end.  Did you need me to tell you that?

The prettiest girl on Tom Hanks' island

The Culture: Perhaps the one positive thing about this movie is the attractiveness of rural Greek life.  The scenery and the thought of doing nothing on a Greek island doesn’t seem too shabby.

Agenda Danger:  This one fails if it has an agenda.  Obviously, the Italians at the beginning of the war were the bad guys, so them taking a few years of the war off seems like a plus.

Best Picture that year:  Silence of the Lambs

Rating:  Skip this movie and go have yourself a banana split.