Hop

The past of the thirteenyearold refugee Justin is in Burundi, his future is in Belgium, as far as he is concerned. But he and his father Dieudonné Karikurubu do not have a residence permit and live as illegal immigrants. In their small flat in Brussels, Dieudonné most likes to watch soccer, most of all to the efforts of the Belgian eleven with the star forward Emile M’Penza, born in the Congo. M’Penza, who was given Belgian nationality, is Justin’s great example. During a game between the Red Devils and Sweden, Justin taps into the television cable. Without knowing, he disrupts the picture of the downstairs neighbours, who call the cops. Dieudonné is arrested. Justin manages to escape, but his father is in danger of being deported. Justin makes a pact with a former anarchist (Jan Decleir) and his girlfriend (Antje de Boeck) to get his father out of the hands of the system.Despite the serious themes, Hop has a light and fairytale quality and often takes a humorous approach. Standaert says he adopted this style because, in Africa, humour is a polite way of expressing despair. He shot the film in black and white on the new CineAlta 24p system. The wonderful photography is one of the film’s trump cards.