Contemporary diasporas: representations of the migration crisis in cinema

Abstract

The migratory movements which shape contemporary diasporas are a global phenomenon, mainly as an effect of economic globalization and conflicts. This research analyzes how migration crisis is represented, especially in the context of Africans crossing the ocean towards the European coast. Sequences from the films Fogo ao Mar (2016) and Eu, Capitão (2023) are analyzed to reflect on the representations of the immigrant journey toward Europe. The first one is a documentary released at the beginning of the mass African refugee crisis across the Mediterranean Sea toward Europe. The second, produced seven years later, is a fictional account of two teenagers’ journey to Italy. For this study, the concepts of diaspora and representation are critically examined, as they are fundamental to understanding diasporic visuality in media narratives that expose testimonial pain through the lens of a reality shock. Next, a content-based film analysis is conducted, which raises reflections on the diasporic journeys portrayed in the productions. In both cases, the circumstances of the newly arrived migrants echo the historical imagery of slave ships reaching colonial territories. They depict the suffering of refugees but, simultaneously, highlight how such victims often become drifting bodies, whose identities, values, and pains can be subordinated to the distinctions between being human and being a citizen. The borders that separate “us” from “them” go beyond the geographical. Portrayed in an almost mythical way, with characters on typical hero’s journeys, these works reveal a humanitarian crisis that governments have yet to adequately confront.