Where Hands Touch Site

: Asante spent over a decade researching the project, aiming to show that Black people were not just observers of the Holocaust but victims of its machinery. Where Hands Touch - The Story Behind The Film

The 2018 film Where Hands Touch , directed by Amma Asante, serves as a haunting exploration of a nearly forgotten chapter of World War II history: the lives of Afro-German children under the Third Reich. Set in 1944 Berlin, the movie follows Leyna (Amandla Stenberg), a biracial teenager fighting for her identity in a regime that deems her "undesirable". A Narrative of Survival and Identity

: Leyna’s mother, who desperately tries to navigate the bureaucracy of the Nazi state to keep her daughter safe. Where Hands Touch

The film is inspired by the historical reality of approximately 25,000 Black people living in Germany during the war. Asante was particularly drawn to the stories of the so-called "Rhineland bastards"—children born to German women and African soldiers who occupied the Rhineland after World War I.

: Under the Nazis, these children were often subjected to forced sterilization to prevent "racial defilement". : Asante spent over a decade researching the

: A biracial girl struggling to assert her German identity while navigating systemic persecution.

: Plays Lutz's father, a prominent Nazi soldier who embodies the brutal ideology of the era. Shedding Light on the "Rhineland Bastards" A Narrative of Survival and Identity : Leyna’s

The Forgotten Faces of History: Exploring "Where Hands Touch"