Rebecca Franklin: Falling for Sahara

Falling for Sahara was a budget movie and you can really tell. The so called 'actors' portrayed African youths growing up in Australia facing problems like racism, family expectations and stereotypes. The director Khoa Do added football into this 'movie' which is irrelevant to the whole story line. Every film Khoa Do makes has football in it, what is his obsession with it? The story line behind this film is not something I would pick up at video easy but has a good measure of themes and characters issues. If they gave this movie more time in writing and had a better budget It might not make me so bored that ripping my eyes out sounds fun.

This Sahara girl  is a liar.  After finding alcohol she and Ramsey drank it, just after telling Ben that she didn’t drink. Why would she do this? Also the ending to this movie was confusing and not in a good way. What was on the letter? Why did she come back? And Was he just imaging her? They didn't clear up a lot of confusion throughout the movie. The only compliment I have for this movie is the sound track. It has good music and it really suits the movie and where the movie is filmed. Just because the film industry gave them a small budget  doesn’t mean that they couldn’t have made more from things like fundraising.

 Even though there are some good themes and messages in this story/ film, they are not expressed in an interesting way which will make viewers watch the movie again. They really need to work on the story line and the way they make characters act. I don’t believe that people in the characters position would really act or behave the way the characters act/ behaved in the movie.

But they do show very important issues that young migrants might face like culture troubles, not feeling like you belong and family pressure. Lots of people face problems like these but this just shows a different side of the problems we all face.

I give this film a 1.5 out of 5 

Jermaine Guglielmi: Falling for Sahara

‘Falling for Sahara’ is an Australian film directed by Khoa Do that covers the lives of three refugees Beniam, Ramsy and MJ who are all best friends that live in Flemington housing commission flats. They all have a love for football and the new girl Sahara. During the film each of the friends have an encounter with Sahara, first Beniam, then Ramsy and MJ who then all fight over her and ruin their friendship.

The film did not intrigue me as it isn’t a film I would watch out of interest. The storyline didn’t catch my attention as it was boring and I didn’t see the point in it. The good features in the film were that it had a lot of realism and most of the situations would happen in real life.  The refugee’s lives weren’t fully explained but some parts gave us a bit of information on the characters. For example Beniam and Ramsy were talking about how MJ should tell Sahara about him being in a campus where he saw a lot of dead bodies; this tells us that he has been in some bad situations in the past.

The main plot in the film is all the guys like Sahara and all try to fight for her ruining their friendship in the process. Beniam says that Sahara is his because he took her out to the club, Ramsy and MJ don’t agree with him but they don’t say that she is theirs. MJ then starts falling in love with her, he asks his friends that he lives with what should he do, they told him to tell her he loves her but he never says it to her. But at the end she appears on the roof with him, this situation wasn’t explained too well and no one knows how she managed to come back to Australia.

Apart from the films low budget, the structure of it fit in well with the characters and the actors were decent and didn’t make the movie look that bad. I do not know of anyone that I would recommend the movie to. Overall I would rate the movie about 3.5 out of 10 as it is just watchable but not something I would watch again or would have chosen to watch out of interest. But if you know of anyone who likes movies that use similar concept to this one I would recommend it to them.

Petros Kollis: Falling for Sahara

'Falling For Sahara' is a film which describes the lives of three young African friends. They all fight for the love of one girl while one of them likes to play football. Football is such a big thing in their lives because it brings people together and that’s what makes it a significant factor in their lives. 

The name of the girl that they all like is Sahara. Her culture doesn’t allow her to do what she wants. There are specific rules that she has to follow, one of them being going to her country and getting married to someone that her parents pick. She personally didn’t want to go through with this so she tried to convince people to change the culture. However trying to change a whole generation worth of culture would almost be impossible. 

Racism was also an issue in this film. At the start of the film when Ramsy had his footy trials, he claimed that all the other boys wouldn’t pass him the ball. He accused the coach of being racist when he didn’t give him another shot. This is one example of racism in this film. Another example of racism in this film is when the police came up to MJ when he was sitting down and talking with Sahara. He had done nothing wrong and he was asked to show his ID and he was taken to the police station. These are two examples of racism in the film. 


I personally enjoyed watching Falling For Sahara because it was such a well organised film and it made you anticipate what would happen next. I would rate this film an 8 out of 10 because I really liked the plot and how it was set out.

Faith Tuitea: Falling for Sahara Review

Falling for Sahara directed by Khoa Do is a film set in the suburban streets of Melbourne of three immigrated teenage boys all finding themselves falling for the same girl. Throughout the film the boys experience conflict, racism, high expectations from loved ones, problems with equality that make them question whether Australia is the place them. They express their friendship, bond and companionship through their love and dedication of Australian football. The film also displays the problems they face being accepted as refugees within the Australian community and the only person who seems to understand their frustration and confusion is the beautiful Sahara. Let alone do they realize Sahara is also facing difficulties of accepting her culture and traditions in which she desperately tries to change.

The script for this film however I thought wasn’t as good as some lines were predictable and ‘corny’. The acting however was alright considering the film was produced on a tight budget and it was great that the actors in the film could relate their own personal experiences to their characters which was extremely inspiring.

Many events take place throughout the film having it’s up and downs. Although in my opinion I felt there was no actual meaning to the film and the storyline felt a little pointless and predictable. I also felt that there was too much going on which sort of confused the audience trying to keep up with the message the film was trying to deliver. I didn’t really enjoy the film due to it lacking in creativity but it did still have some potential.

If I could try and connect the film to everyday life refugees trying to adjust to the Australian culture is definitely not easy in terms of language, discrimination and their own culture, traditions, morals and beliefs. You see in the media people judging others and creating stereotypes but I guess Falling for Sahara gives us a reality of what refugees are going through and that maybe we need to question whether how we are treating them as a whole is fair.

Although I didn’t enjoy the movie as much as I thought I would I took a lot of the film and saw things from a refugee’s point of view. It also made me realize that they are finding it difficult to adjust to a new country and us not accepting them as a whole isn’t helpful at all and for that I rate Falling for Sahara 3 out of 5.

Indigenous Identity Conflict

 Natasha Waganeen, Jada Alberts, Frances Djulibing and Djamangi Gaykamangu are all famous aboriginal actors. On Monday the 29^th of April at 6:30 this group decided to return to their St Kilda Hotel. As they hailed a cab, the taxi driver took one look at them and drove off. The same thing happened second, third and fourth taxi. At this point Hick (the choreographer) was in tears. ''They would just pull up, see us and drive off,'' Natasha said. ''We had to get someone to hail a taxi for us who was non-indigenous and we would hide around the corner and by the time she got the taxi we would bolt over, open the door and jump in.'' On their way to work the following morning a passenger on the same tram broke out to anger, declaring ‘You Aboriginals don’t exist ‘.

This links to identity and belonging because it discriminates against the aboriginal culture. They have been here in Australia for over 40,000 years. To have people from other cultures come here and make them feel like second-class citizens is unfair to the indigenous people of Australia. If anything, people in Australia should be helping and stopping the discrimination toward them, they belong here, just like everyone else in Australia, this is their home. You don’t see them going to other countries and discriminating against other cultures, why should people do it to them here? It’s purely unfair.

Catherine and Natalie of 10B

Jasons Collins - Identity and Belonging

Jason Collins, “came out” as being the first openly Gay male athlete, on Monday 29^th April.

Jason said in an interview on Tuesday, “I want to do something that would make a statement, even if I wasn’t really open yet.”

“For months now, Collins had planned to come out publically; he had been filled with fear and was worried about the negative reaction that would come from being in the spotlight.” – New York Times.

This article relates to identity and belonging by showing the importance of knowing who you truly are and being honest with yourself and allowing others to come to terms with it.

Jason explains in an interview that he’s "happy with being black and gay and that he’s happy with being different and is hoping to be a role model for others".

Jason has been over whelmed with the support that he has recieved from NBA fans and the very people he thought would be against him.

We, as 10B, are learning about identity and belonging, Jason Collins demonstrates the importance of knowing your identity and being true with yourself.

By Natalie and Cathrine from 10B

Hello From 10B

10B is a class of many diverse students. There are a variety of different identities and that makes us who we are. Many of us follow different religions and come from different backgrounds. That helps us accept each other because at the end of the day…we are all different. Some of us came to this country not long ago… including our teacher Mr Burns who is an immigrant from the UK, who came to explore the lifestyle in Australia.  We are all different in many ways, for example our appearance, personalities and beliefs but at the end of the day we all belong to 10B. Posted By Sana & Zaineb