Alis

In a home in Columbia, ten young women take a seat, one after another, and close their eyes. They are asked to picture Alis, an imaginary friend, and to bring her story to life in a creative dialogue with the filmmakers. Like the interviewees, Alis used to live on the streets of Bogotá. This imaginary companion is the seed for an extraordinary documentary format, serving as a reflective and delicate point of entry to the protagonists’ own stories. Alis becomes a surface for the projection of past traumas, or the travails of companions who fell by the wayside, and also for life visions and desires for the future. The imaginary friend is a blank slate for exploring individual ideas of freedom, as well as battles that have yet to be fought. (Berlinale)