Kino Eye: Waiting for asylum

Submitted by AWL on 13 July, 2021 - 7:30 Author: John Cunningham
Last Resort

There’s been much coverage recently in Solidarity about migration and about the excellent news of victory for the campaign to stop Osime Brown being deported.

The film Last Resort, directed by Pawel Pawlikowski and released in 2000, tells the tale of a Russian woman, Tanya (Dina Korzum), and her son Artyom (Artyom Strelnikov) who arrive in the UK expecting to meet Tanya’s “fiancé” at the airport. He is a fake, and never shows up.

Tanya claims asylum and she is sent by the authorities to Stonehaven, a dilapidated south-east seaside resort which doubles up as a makeshift detention centre, dreary in the depths of an English winter.

Tanya is offered work in a porn film (she refuses). The local fish and chip shop owner cheats her. But eventually she is befriended by Alfie (Paddy Considine) the manager of an amusement arcade, an ex-con with a hidden past.

Having put her trust in another man who has betrayed her, can Tanya trust Alfie? She feels trapped. Processing the asylum claim seems to go on for ever. In the meantime Tanya and her son wait…

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