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Locarno Film Festival 2021 | Brotherhood

Locarno: Brotherhood, directed by Francesco Montagner, follows a story of three young brothers in Bosnia, Jabir, Usama and Useir, who were born into raising a family of shepherds and follows their footsteps of what is expected by their strict father, Ibrahim.

Ibrahim was a Muslim veteran who has raised a radicalized family of the three brothers, practicing Islam who engages in Jihadism. In the beginning of the plot, Ibrahim has been sentenced for 23 months in prison for uploading videos of himself preaching Islamic terrorism. A specific scene in the movie shows the brothers watching the videos of their father uploaded on the Internet.

As Ibrahim prepares for his sentence, the three brothers have been given strict expectations to feed their family, protect the herd, and get an education during his time in jail.  As there is no mother present nor mentioned in their family, the three young brothers are left to be the man of the house.

Their family was run in a patriarchal society, where only their father dictated what is the right path in their life. Without their father around, the movie follows a journey of their “Brotherhood” to figure out how to adhere to their father’s expectations and survive on their own for the next two years.

What makes the film interesting is that the three boys age ranges are vastly different from each other, giving viewers three different point of views on how their life perceptions were like under their father’s strict upbringing. Jabir appears to be at the coming-of-age stage of becoming an adult and is assigned to be the man to provide for his brothers.  Usama appears to be in his teens who must work hard to raise the shepherds. And Useir is still considered either a child or early adolescent who goes to school to get educated. All three of these brothers work together to figure out their struggles and support, while still trying to figure out who they really are without Ibrahim’s guidance.

Even though Jabir is considered the man of the family, throughout the movie, his character reveals he was sheltered like his brothers from the rest of the world and only knows what is considered normal life by his father.  Jabir begins to realize the freedom he had where he can choose to live independently, to take care of himself, with hopes to run his own business so he did not have to depend on others.

Francesco Montagner carefully crafted scene where Jabir discussed with his teen brother Usama about independence vs taking care of others in the community.  Jabir feels that raising shepherds is far from what he wanted to do in life, and that it was only due to the upbringing demands of Ibrahim that confined him from his freedom of choice.  Usama feels that it is more of his destiny, possibly his own decision to want to raise shepherds like their father. The scene helps spell out how one realizes a choice can be made, where the other may be making a perceived choice, which makes an interesting dynamic in what is considered one’s rightful path.  While each brother has their own opinions of their life path, they make mention of the give and take situations that go along with it. The scene ended with a quote “You know what they say, ‘money talks loud and clear’”.

As Jabir is away searching for independence while Usama is raising shepherds, Usama is often left to take care of his Useir. Usama appears to be following the strict footsteps of Ibrahim, which can be shown in a scene where he tries to convince Useir to stop watching his videos on the phone and to study the Quran. Useir sometimes obliges, but also uses what he learned from his education to question some of the decisions Usama makes that contradicts what he learned from the Quran. This dynamic shows the intelligence Useir has gained from school vs Usama who only knows what he is taught by Ibrahim, sparking debates of what is right and wrong and quoting from the Quran to back up each others’ statements.

When Ibrahim returns from prison, he brings the three brothers together and expresses disappointment as his expectations were not met in taking care of each other. The film descends into a regression of the three brothers reverting to their father’s demands and no longer able to experience their initial freedom to fully realize what they truly wanted to be in life other than the radicalized nature of their family.  The film truly expresses the life of what could have been if they did not have the patriarchal family system only to return to it when things are considered “normal” again for their family.

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