“Can We Allow Ourselves to Make Films?” Rethinking Production Norms through the Lens of Migration

This article examines the challenges filmmakers face when producing first-person films about migration within the European film industry, which includes films in which the director is simultaneously a subject in and of the film. Although such films have proliferated in recent years, little is known about the directors’ positionality or the production processes behind these works. Drawing on interviews with filmmakers who have navigated the European film industry to share personal and often intimate perspectives on post-migration life in Europe, the article examines the key challenges they encounter in the production process and the tactics they turned to in the negotiation of these barriers. What do their lived experiences reveal about the inclusivity and accessibility of the European film industry? Taking the collective dimension of film production, what role can interpersonal relationships play in mitigating these challenges and barriers as they emerge? The article emphasizes the need to recognize the directors’ vulnerable positionality with respect to migration as well as the importance of considering the specificity of the needs that emerge from it in order to be able to establish a thriving collaboration based on trust. It also urges for more institutional responsibility towards the structural improvement of the position of migrant filmmakers in the European film industry, and for a critical reassessment of crediting and copyright norms in the context of first-person filmmaking.