One in a Million Review: A 10-Year Migration Saga Both Epic and Intimate

One in a Million
(UK, 102 min.)
Dir. Itab Azzam, Jack MacInnes
Prod. Raney Aronson-Rath, Will Anderson, James Bluemel, Andrew Palmer
Programme: World Cinema Documentary Competition (World premiere)

 

“Does freedom have a price?” director Itab Azzam asks Nisreen during One in a Million. The question arises some time after Nisreen and her family land in Germany. They escape Syria during the course of this epic ten-year production, but there are both losses and gains when they arrive on the other side.

Nisreen struggles with the question. It’s extremely emotional as the query arrives at a turning point her life. At the risk of spoilers, this review limits some details, but the mother’s response captures the complexities that arise when generations of refugees arrive in a new land. Freedom brings different definitions and carries different price tags.

These points find a touching set of eyes through which One in a Million sees the global migration crisis. The find observes the family’s plight largely through Nisreen’s daughter Isra’a. She’s barely a teenager when production begins. The young girl is all smiles when the camera observes her in Aleppo, and then Turkey after the family flees the violence that devastates the city. Isra’a serves as an unflappable guide as she tours the camera through the market. She shows off tools that will facilitate the family’s upcoming trip overseas, like a pouch to protect a phone from water.

One in a Million observes as Isra’a and her family make the perilous journey by boat to Greece. Isra’a captures some of the trip herself thanks to the dry sack. It’s a difficult voyage, but this footage of a family in flight speaks to the many life-or-death gambles that people around the world take. Before leaving, Isra’a explains how each of her parents has a plan to save a younger child if the boat capsizes. She’s responsible for saving herself, she explains without breaking her smile.

Cut to a year later and Isra’a adapts to life in Cologne, Germany well. As the years go by, she learns German, enjoys the ability to do what she wants without worry, and even finds a boyfriend. However, life away from Aleppo proves difficult for her father, Tarek. He retreats inward as he sees Germans marching in protest of immigrants. He worries about the loss of language and tradition. Moreover, his Isra’a’s embrace of liberal attitudes gives him much anxiety. Cue the breaking point that inspires Nisreen to redefine freedom.

The ten-year journey of One in a Million traverses an epic distance both literal and figurative. As the family fractures, the elder members of the story face personal awakenings. (Isra’a’s siblings, who are quite young when the story begins, don’t receive on-camera testimonials.) The daughter, mother, and father force themselves to ask why they left. Each of the three finds a different level of freedom in the new land, which becomes further complicated with the liberation of Syria in 2024.

For Tarek, as he stands among a crowd of revellers, his smile masks obvious sadness. For Isra’a, there’s a chance to reconnect with what she lost and an opportunity to start something new with her Syrian husband Mohammad, also a refugee in Cologne. For Nisreen, there’s no going back to the life she had.

The film gamely accepts the challenge of the balancing act at its disposal. Each family member serves as a guide for the story. They’re not voices of equal weight, as Isra’a stays put as the star of the show, but the filmmakers respect the space their characters need, sometimes waiting years for the answers to arrive. When they do arise, they come organically with the power of self-assessment. It proves far more compelling than prodding them out the family could, especially when some delayed answers carry the weight of regret that they survived so much and yet couldn’t see the journey through together.

This deeply moving film asks how one conceives of a homecoming when the very idea of home shatters. Directors Itab Azzam and Jack MacInnes bookend the film with Isra’a’s return to Aleppo. She witnesses in absolute horror the remains of her city. Debris lines the street, piles of rubble stand taller than buildings, and the structures that remain are barely skeletons. One sees in the bombed-out shells an illustration of her family, blown apart by their forced relocation.

As One in a Million observes the family’s terrifying voyage to safety and, eventually, its rejuvenation with new beginnings, the film looks to the past with neither romanticism nor anger. It’s a frank, if personable, exploration of one family’s journey amid a crisis. The longitudinal nature of the film laudably observes the dynamics of generational change within the family, but also the maturation of culture more broadly as Isra’a grows before our eyes and her parents wear the emotional toll of the journey in the lines that creep across their weary faces. It’s a portrait of love and loss with equal measure.

One in a Million premiered at the 2026 Sundance Film Festival.

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