MY WAY

MY WAY tells the journey of young Hussain from Afghanistan to Germany and his life in Germany. The film was shot in five countries: Afghanistan, Iran, Greece, Turkey, Germany and in addition numerous interviews were conducted to also shed light on the social discussion in Germany, including Claudia Roth, Heinrich Bedford-Strohm, Joachim Herrmann, Natalie Amiri, Gerald Knaus, Claus-Peter Reisch and many others.

MY WAY is a film about the devastating situation in Afghanistan, about flight and successful integration. Starting with the arrival at Munich’s main train station in the summer of 2015, the film tells of the suffering of refugees, but at the same time sends an optimistic signal that flight can end well, a new home can be found and integration can succeed, even if wounds remain.

MY WAY is about xenophobia and welcome culture, about a society torn apart and about great voluntary commitment. Last but not least, on the occasion of the 70th anniversary of the Geneva Refugee Convention, MY WAY gives an impression of how questions of migration could be addressed and answered in the future in view of more than 80 million refugees worldwide.

How it began

Jakob Gatzka met Hussain in the fall of 2012 when his family took him and five other boys from Afghanistan in. “It was immediately clear to me that the topic of flight would occupy me for some time. I wanted to find out everything that led to the flight and what had happened. Over a few years, I gave Hussain German lessons and trust developed. So much so that in 2015 he took me to Iran and introduced me to his mother who lived there. At that moment I had already started to make his story into a film, which will also be published as a book.

Jakob Gatzka studied German and philosophy, was a guest student at the University of Television and Film in Munich, worked for director Dominik Graf and an agency, and was a television writer (“Soko Wismar,” ZDF).