Film for My Mum
In 2010 I took my camera home for Christmas in order to survive the first holidays with my sister away. My mother then told me she appreciates my films, but she does not understand why they have to be so serious and depressive. Then this idea came to my mind. What if I made a film for her, with her, and – most importantly – one made by her? What if we made it together?
We started the script writing process. Her task was to create scenes for her perfect film. My mother is a huge fan of tear-jerking romance. Especially when they are set in the 19th century. So I expected nothing more than clichés, banalities and some serious amount of long beautiful dresses. I was mistaken. My mother’s ideas reflect her dreams, hopes, disappointments and memories. In an unusual way. The princess is having her first kiss with the palace gardener. But at the same time she lays immobilised in a plaster cast, head to toe. A Soviet cosmonaut flirts with a cosmodrome radio officer who in the end turns out to be fat and ugly.
I began to see my mother in a new light. I watch her as she rediscovers herself. Not as a mother looking after her children and grandchildren, and taking care of my father who suffers from a mental condition, but as an individual with her own wishes and fears.
I turned thirty. Last year I got married. I don’t rebel against my parents anymore. Worse, I keep discovering similarities to them. I have been recording my family life for 5 years and several questions keep coming back. How to live a happy life? How not to make the mistakes our parents made?
Film for My Mum shows there is no such thing as an ordinary family. It is a tribute to the everyday heroes of our lives, their great dreams and hidden desires. Partly set in a 19th century castle.
We started the script writing process. Her task was to create scenes for her perfect film. My mother is a huge fan of tear-jerking romance. Especially when they are set in the 19th century. So I expected nothing more than clichés, banalities and some serious amount of long beautiful dresses. I was mistaken. My mother’s ideas reflect her dreams, hopes, disappointments and memories. In an unusual way. The princess is having her first kiss with the palace gardener. But at the same time she lays immobilised in a plaster cast, head to toe. A Soviet cosmonaut flirts with a cosmodrome radio officer who in the end turns out to be fat and ugly.
I began to see my mother in a new light. I watch her as she rediscovers herself. Not as a mother looking after her children and grandchildren, and taking care of my father who suffers from a mental condition, but as an individual with her own wishes and fears.
I turned thirty. Last year I got married. I don’t rebel against my parents anymore. Worse, I keep discovering similarities to them. I have been recording my family life for 5 years and several questions keep coming back. How to live a happy life? How not to make the mistakes our parents made?
Film for My Mum shows there is no such thing as an ordinary family. It is a tribute to the everyday heroes of our lives, their great dreams and hidden desires. Partly set in a 19th century castle.
Laugh if You can
A story about people who spend most of their time in their dreams - a land so real that making out the difference between the dream and the real world is their curse. They suffer from a rare condition - narcolepsy, which makes them suddenly fall asleep - regardless of their location or the thing that they are doing. They cannot control it. They fall asleep while meeting people, taking care of their children, working or driving. Some fall asleep due to a sudden storm of emotion when they watch an emotional movie, hear a good joke or fight with their spouses. Their bodies betray them. Their dreams tend to be so real that after waking up they cannot tell whether that was a dream or the real world. But the film will not be about the condition but about people whose lives are led in two worlds: the dream-world, which only they can access, and the real world that goes past them, letting their sleep steal the passing and unique moments, about all that goes past them when they are asleep. It will be a story about people who have to deprive themselves of emotions to be able to control their bodies. How can that be - a person forced to subdue emotions in order to live her life? Isn't that what we aim for us, the "healthy" ones? Just as the narcoleptics, we try to hide our emotions. The only difference is that we do have a choice.