Measures of distance

I found this movie very moving and deep. The images were layered with a hand-written letter, creating a sort of barbed wire fence, which evokes the theme of confinement. The body of the mother of the filmmaker is exposed in very domestic behaviors and reveals very intimate moments between mother and daughter. The themes of exile, refugee, war, fear, harshness of life, lack of hope and importance of one’s identity are very strongly developed through the voice over of the filmmaker. When the post office is bombed and the only way to communicate with the outside world vanishes, a bigger metaphor for incommunicability is brought up by the mother.
It was interesting to see the figure of the dad transversally coming in the movie through his feelings of being invaded in his property (the mother’s body). I didn’t see the body of the filmmaker but I could surely hear her voice and picture her total presence in the movie.
~camilla