EXCLUSIVE: Trailer for DOK Leipzig title Love Is Not an Orange
- We bring you an exclusive trailer for Moldovan filmmaker Otilia Babara's first feature-length documentary, which will world-premiere in DOK Leipzig's new Panorama section
The first feature-length documentary by Moldovan filmmaker Otilia Babara, Love Is Not an Orange [+see also:
trailer
interview: Otilia Babara
film profile], is set to world-premiere in DOK Leipzig's newly established Panorama section, which focuses on Central and Eastern European cinema. Cineuropa exclusively brings you the trailer for the film.
Consisting of private archive footage, the doc tells the story of how, in the early 1990s, women left Moldova in large numbers to provide for their families. Unable to return home, they found a peculiar way to stay in touch: sending large cardboard boxes filled with gifts and food that you could only dream about in those days. In return, their children would send videotapes. This exchange became a ritual among thousands of families. Video cameras and presents allowed these mothers and children to share glimpses of their realities while being apart.
Through these intimate private archives, the film depicts the fragility of family bonds through the eyes of a generation of mothers and daughters who were forced to live apart in order to survive. While doing so, it portrays a post-Soviet country caught at the crossroads of history, a country whose women were unwittingly put in charge of making the transition from communism to capitalism.
“These archives – in their ability to bring the collective experience of migration into the film – grew to become the story itself. What started as a fascination for the way people communicate turned into an interest in the visible contrasts between what is happening in our lives and what we decide to share with others,” says Babara.
Love Is Not an Orange is competing for the MDR Film Prize at DOK Leipzig. It is a co-production between Moldova’s Otilia Babara, France’s Algeria Productions, the Netherlands’ Basalt Film and Belgium’s Clin d’oeil films.
Watch our exclusive trailer below:
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