Stateless Review: A Haunting Tale About Immigration

Coming to Netflix this week is the powerful limited series, Stateless, which follows the stories of four strangers whose lives collide at an immigration detention center in the middle of the Australian desert.

The limited series is inspired by true events, which makes it feel that much more poignant to watch. It’s created by Cate Blanchett, Tony Ayres, and Elise McCredie.

As one might expect, Stateless explores the atrocities that occur within the detention center as well as a flawed immigration system. Its largest focus is on Sofie Werner (Yvonne Strahovski), an airline hostess an Australian citizen who goes on the run from a dangerous cult and winds up being wrongfully detained.

Sofie’s story is fascinating and complex. There’s clearly a background on mental illness, and she struggles with her family relationships. The cult she winds up being a part of touts itself as a self-help facility run by Gordon and Pat Masters (Dominic West and Cate Blanchett) and exploits Sofie’s simple desire to be loved. 

It’s through flashbacks over the course of several episodes that we come to learn how Sofie winds up in the Australian detention center as an Australian citizen herself, and her situation reveals the flaws of the system.

Strahovski’s performance as Sofie is impeccable in every way. The subtle way in which her expressions shift between hope and hopelessness, fear and comfort, confusion and clarity, is remarkable.

What’s unfortunate is that so much of her story is left untold. Stateless works well as a limited series, but it could have been served better by a few more episodes.

That could have not only allowed us to dive a bit deeper into Sofie’s story, but into the other key characters as well — and the way those characters’ stories overlap with one another.

There’s so much more to this story that we just don’t get to see, and it winds up feeling just a bit disjointed. 

Another one of those stories is that of Ameer (Fayssal Bazzi), an Afghan refugee who wants only to find safety for his family and himself, but gets caught in the system in horrifying ways. His story is the most heartbreaking, and really, the more important story to tell.

After all, though this is a series that’s set in Australia, it hits close to home for United States viewers. As Ameer’s story unravels, we’re forced to confront the flaws of the system — with each detail, it becomes more and more maddening to see the way the system chews up a man who has tried to do everything by the book. 

There’s no direct villain in Stateless, aside from the system itself. The two characters we focus on who are on the other side of the system are not so much villains as they are byproducts of that system. 

There is Cam (Jai Courtney), a young father who takes the job of a guard at the detention center in order to better provide for his family.

What he finds, though, is that this is a job that threatens his own humanity. It breaks him down and we see the way it begins to change him.

That’s yet another piece of the overall story that could have used more fleshing out, but there’s enough there to understand we’re supposed to feel conflicted about him early on. 

Rounding out the core group of characters is Clare (Asher Keddie), who has been tasked with managing the detention center. Much like Cam, Clare’s humanity is put into question by the job itself. For the most part, she believes in everything she’s doing, but as the series progresses, we have the chance to see her internal dilemma. 

All of these pieces work together to create a series that is captivating, haunting, and timely. The entire thing is beautifully shot, with a few particularly breathtaking shots, including one that makes good use of a red balloon.

This is a story that sticks with you and is bound to encourage discussion. It’s also one that will leave you wanting more. 

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Will you be watching Stateless? Share your thoughts in the comments below!

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Stateless will be available for streaming Wednesday, July 8th on Netflix.

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