User Reviews

I saw this eye-opening and superbly-told tale of the high cost of desire to move from Africa to Europe at the Toronto International Film Festival. The film director, Perrin, and lead actor who played Zola were present.

One word describes this for me: BEAUTIFUL! The story held tight with 3 views of the situation coming into a nexus of need and desperation, from the vacationing German in Spain to the Senegalese/Congo trying desperately to find refuge in Europe, to the office assigned to work on cases involving illegal immigration.

The characters lives are made richer by the further complications of the people in their lives who tug and pull at them, who mirror and reflect the protagonists' needs and pains, and who interweave plots, story, and visual stimulation with water, the sun, and the beach as images that make this a visually and emotionally interesting story, based in part on events that are happening now.

I enjoyed this movie very much and recommend it. Well done!

"Die Farbe des Ozeans" or "Color of the Ocean" is a German/Spanish collaboration from 2011, so this 90-minute movie had its 5th anniversary last year already. The writer and director is Maggie Peren and she has a new movie coming out this year. By now, however, it is still her most recent full feature film, but probably not among her really most known overall if you take a look at some of the stuff she did earlier in her career. She also was a relatively prolific actress in fact until roughly a decade ago. Anyway, this film here deals with a very common subject these days: the refugee crisis and we get to witness what a German tourist does when she is directly confronted with the crisis. This tourist is played by Sabine Timoteo who I somewhat like and besides Friedrich Mücke she is probably also the only known cast member in here, at least in Germany. This also has to do with the fact that the cast includes actors from other countries too, especially Spain, which is why you will also hear occasional Spanish (and French) language in here. So how impressed was I by the overall outcome? Sadly not too much. Several actors struggled with delivering the material properly and I also think the film dragged on a few occasions. It is by no means a truly bad film and the subject elevated the material in terms of relevance, but sadly the material does not elevate the subject here and there is nothing really that makes this film stand out from all other films about the fugitive/refugee situation coming out these days. Even if you probably can make a statement pro this movie that back in 2011, it wasn't such a hot subject yet and Peren probably did a decent job in predicting what would become and stay relevant in the years to come.

Back to the movie: I usually like Timoteo more than I did here. As for Mücke: I am frequently not impressed and I wasn't really here either. Then again, he does not have great material to work with. Not only Timoteo, but even other male actors have better material to work with i would say. At times the cinematography is pretty nice, but this alone is not enough to make up for the many other flaws this film does indeed have. I wish i could have liked it more than I did all in all. Of course, it is not disastrous crap like "Mädchen Mädchen!", but I really hope Peren's new film will turn out better again, at least on the level of Napola hopefully. The subject for this 2011 movie here definitely offered the possibly of something way better than we eventually got. Thumbs down from me. Not recommended.

I had the pleasure to watch this movie on the 7th Zurich Film Festival and was deeply impressed by the power of the content, as well as the great cinematography of the movie.

It interweaves the fate of the refugees, a father and his son in particular, as well as the story of a Spanish boarder police men and a German tourist couple and how their lives change upon interaction with the refugees.

The movie shows with great honesty how overwhelming the issue is and how little can actually be done, as the source of the problems lies deep and beyond the power of the individual. However, it delivers a strong message simultaneously, not to close the eyes, to engage with the issue. Personally I find the line, told by the José to Carla "You stopped and tried to help. Thats more than most people do. You stopped..." very thought provoking. How often am I myself closing my eyes? If the opportunity arises to watch this movie I strongly suggest to use this opportunity as it is a deeply enriching movie.