Dir: Cécile Embleton, Alys Tomlinson. UK, 2024. 91 mins. Belarusian, French with English subtitles.
For admirers of the stark beauty found in films by Béla Tarr and Andrei Tarkovsky, this stunningly beautiful documentary focuses on a young Orthodox nun and the life-changing decision she is faced with.
Mother Vera, known as Olga in her wild past, lives a contemplative life in a remote Belarusian monastery. The details of her former life, involving criminality, drugs and motorbikes, seem as far away from the silence and snow of the convent as can be. Yet she is daily reminded of the sins of her past by the presence of the two hundred men living in rehabilitation at the local farm. Even after twenty years as a nun, the secular and the spiritual are not at peace.
Told primarily in static, black and white imagery, this unique feature affords a glimpse into a world far removed from our own.
Followed by Q&A with co-directors Cécile Embleton and Alys Tomlinson.
