FREEDOM OF MOVEMENT

Evoking the Olympic marathon from Rome 1960, in which the Ethiopian runner Abebe Bikila conquered the African continent’s first gold medal, running barefoot and becoming a sporting legend and a symbol of the Africa that was freeing itself of colonialism, the directors have re-contextualized amidst Rome’s controversial rationalist architecture, a new race involving refugees and immigrants staking a claim to their freedom of movement. The film examines the complexity of ideological, political and architectural implications of Bikila’s 1960 Olympic gold medal run to this day.

Trailer

Director

MAROAN EL SANI and NINA FISCHER’s works together include: KLUB 2000 – ROM, PARIS, MARZAHN (1998), THE RISE (2007), SAYONARA HASHIMA (2009), NARITA FIELD TRIP (2010), I LIVE IN FEAR – AFTER MARCH 11 (2013), CONTAMINATED HOME (2014), DYNAMIS (2014), DER DREISATZ DER IDENTITÄT (2016), FREEDOM OF MOVEMENT (2018), and APPROPRIATION TAKES YOU ON A WEIRD RIDE (2019), among others.

Nina Fischer, Maroan el Sani photos © Fischer & el Sani