Both men are confronted with the adversities between their diverging cultures, their set of values as well as the risk of the international engagement in the Hindukush.

She lived with German soldiers, accompanied them on patrols, made contact with the locals and listened to their stories like the one of the 18-year-old Afghan main actor Mohsin Ahmady who does not know his exact date of birth and has had first-hand experience of what it means to grow up in Afghanistan: In 2002, while still a pupil at the Gore Mar High School, he had to deal with the death of his father.

Deborah Young describes in The Hollywood Reporter that the "territories are bound to appreciate the realism and muscular shooting by a woman director and crew (shades of Kathryn Bigelow and Zero Dark Thirty) on location in northern Afghanistan" and that "the immediacy and tension with which Aladag conveys the daily life of the soldiers is something to take home".

[4] Guy Lodge writes in the Variety that the film "is a sensitive corrective to more partisan war dramas" and that the "film's visual palette, as well as its marriage of classic melodrama with contempo grit, is most strongly reminiscent of Susanne Bier's earlier work; if seen in the right places, it’s slick enough to potentially secure her an English-language assignment".

[5] Fionnuala Halliganut wrote in Screen Daily that Inbetween Worlds is a "nuanced story, stylishly shot with a good deal of integrity", which '"should attract international arthouse audiences intrigued by the added weight of a German military presence in a modern battle zone".