Where We Belong
Jacqueline Zünd , Switzerland, 2019o
Five divorced children between about 6 and 16 years of age talk about how they experienced their parents' separation and how they cope with having more than one home. They not only recount their own thoughts and feelings with impressive clarity, but also those of their parents, who we hardly ever meet.
After its cinema premiere last autumn, the film was widely criticised for capturing the children and their environment in consistently stylised images. But underscored by a gently melancholic electropop soundtrack, it is precisely they who make sure that Where We Belong does not lose itself for a moment in the bleakly unformed television realism that threatens this theme. Instead, the outer worlds of the children are transformed into enchanting inner worlds.
Andreas Furler
Filme über Trennungen handeln normalerweise von Geschrei und Streit, die Doku der Schweizerin Jaqueline Zünd (Almost There) hingegen lässt die Kinder einfach reden. Sie tun das in bewundernswerter Aufrichtigkeit, auch wenn sehr viel Schmerz und Einsamkeit spürbar wird. Beachtlich ist auch, dass Zünd die Eltern überhaupt dazu gebracht hat, das zu erlauben. Die Ästhetisierungen sind Geschmackssache, befördern aber einen sinnlichen Eindruck.
Pascal BlumGalleryo
