Mina and The Radio Bandits
Kari Anne Moe / Norway / 2024 / World Premiere / 108 min
There's more than cops and robber stories at stake in this heartbreaking and dramatic film about Norwegian Mina with the kind heart who starts a radio station for (and with) prison inmates. Can she find the line between life and work when an unexpected tragedy strikes?
Mina Hadjian was once Norway’s most popular radio host. But after being fired, she started Bandit Radio, where prisoners are hosts and journalists. Bandit Radio gives them a voice, a second chance and a weekly feeling that they can be something other than criminals. And their stories are good and honest – and we get them from the long-term prisoners themselves. We meet the converted Muslim who used to be a drug addict. The prisoner who transitioned to a woman in prison and for whom Mina provides nail polish and make-up. And then, of course, Rune. A speed-ball of a restless soul with omnivorous eyes and a Solomonic sense that makes him fight the injustice of the world with his fists. Along the way, he heads to Ukraine to go to war against the Russians, leaving his pregnant girlfriend and his radio boss uneasy back in Norway. With her idealistic radio initiative, Mina risks blurring the line between work and personal commitment.