In Our Paradise review – Bosnian sisters struggling to make it abroad in migrant tale

Claudia Marschal's documentary about two sisters leaving the Balkans is short on the intimacy that film can deliver

Featuring Indira and Mehdina, two Bosnian sisters who try to escape their life of poverty in their homeland, Claudia Marschal's documentary observes the xenophobia and financial insecurity faced by immigrants from the Balkans, an area already troubled by a history of political turbulence. The paradise" hinted at in the title, however, is a mirage, as the women and their families struggle to settle down in France and Germany.

Indira and her young children are placed in an immigration centre in Germany where they apply for asylum - which is ultimately denied. As Indira is turned away from what she hoped to be a brighter future, Mehdina is arguably more fortunate, as she was able to emigrate to France - though, at the time, she was only 14 and already married. While people at home presume she has a better life in her new country, she faces constant money worries, forced even to sell her jewellery. Amid such hardships, the film's most moving sequences involve the sisters' children, most of whom are oblivious to the adults' turmoil: Indira's children, for example, can still enjoy a game of hide and seek in the cramped conditions in the immigration centre.