If I Die Today
Camilla Arlien / Denmark / 2025 / World Premiere / 98 min
Seven years in the life of a troubled young man. From his time in prison for attempted murder, to his time as a hopeful parolee, to his fatal decision.
When director Camilla Arlien begins filming Jannik, he is a young man serving a five-year sentence for attempted murder. An Eminem poster hangs in his cell and Jannik gets through his stay by writing down his thoughts and rapping them out. Shortly afterwards, he is released and has to find a foothold. He has a girlfriend, gets a cat, plays the piano, stays clean, goes to school and travels around telling young people about his former life that put him behind bars. Jannik is hopeful, he wants to make up for his past and live a normal life. But it is not easy to be re-socialised when you carry a fragile psyche and live in a society that doesn’t like a criminal record. With each battle he has to fight, the fuse burns shorter and the inner darkness grows deeper for Jannik, who says he has always been more afraid to live than to die. A touching and honest film about not feeling like you belong.