Lost Land

Nine-year-old Somira and her younger brother Shafi are the focus of this moving drama that follows the Rohingya siblings as they journey from a refugee camp in Bangladesh to a relative’s home in Malaysia. By boat, in trucks, and on foot, the children and their family along with other refugees face smugglers’ extortionate demands, natural and human dangers that arise on their trek, and the terrifying possibility of separation as they travel towards some new notion of home. Japanese director Akio Fujimoto has been working on films in Malaysia for over a decade and, after witnessing the cruelty inflicted upon the Rohingya people firsthand, he began work on this powerful film. Working closely with cinematographer Yoshio Kitagawa with the camera often at the eye level of the two children who anchor his film, the resulting work has an immediacy that raises awareness of the crisis while also telling a remarkable human story. —Rod Armstrong