Polish director Pawel Lozinski presents an immersive, intimate portrait of a mother-daughter relationship.
On paper, it sounds like something close to punishment, but the reality is quite different. Polish director Pawel Lozinski adopts a bold approach to chronicling the slow and complex healing process of a damaged relationship between a mother and daughter. Three camera angles, each a single a close-up portrait of a face, capture the confessions of mother, daughter and a male therapist who fires out questions and lightly interprets answers.
The result is immersive, intimate and revealing, a naked torrent of pure emotion and a paean to the power of verbal self expression. The film – named after a line uttered by the mother as tears stream down her cheek – operates as a loud endorsement for diplomacy when it comes to matters of the human heart, and it’s also representative of how, even when we can’t find the words to match our sentiments, there’s are always alternative and roundabout way to communicate our true feelings.
Even though this is a very specific case, and the session we’re watching takes place across a number of different time frames, Lozinski gives the impression that these are unexpurgated confessionals, and the impact they deliver is universal. There isn’t much interest in the domestic tensions that exist between these two people, more the diplomatic act of attempting to patch up the evident rifts.
As a viewer (or voyeur?) you are forced to search for nuance in the words used to try and untangle the mystery of why this war was waged in the first place. Or maybe it isn’t a war – more a slowburn crumbling of relations across and undetermined period. And if the words don’t help, look to the eyes or the facial expressions.
It’s a film about talking as a form therapy, espousing the notion that sometimes by simply saying something out loud you are able to take ownership of it. Although some mild detente is eventually met between these two strangers, the note of climatic hope is fleeting. Maybe they started tussling again by the time they reached the car park?
Published 15 Feb 2018
Watching other people going through therapy. Is this torture?
Takes a good while to synch with the film’s unique rhythm.
Revelatory by the time of its emotional closing scenes.
Saoirse Ronan experiences growing pains in Sacramento in Greta Gerwig’s delightful indie comedy.
A bracing and powerful drama about cultural roots and the nature of identity from director Pawel Pawlikowski.
An exploration of love in 1990s Poland that fails to match its striking visuals with true emotional weight.
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