No Home Movie

Chantal Akerman’s ultra-personal last film gives voice and form to her mother, Natalia (Nelly), whose life is marked by the trauma of Auschwitz, the experience of exile and a longtime, self-elected silence about the past. Edited from over 40 hours of footage, No Home Movie captures the quotidian interactions and extended conversations between mother and daughter as Nelly’s declining health confines her to her Brussels apartment. Moments of tenderness and intimacy are matched by those of transience, isolation and rupture, as Akerman’s attempts to connect with the fading Nelly—whether in person or via Skype—are interspersed with images of emptied, indeterminate locales. Known for her incisive observations into human experience, Akerman’s final film epitomizes her intuitive sense of cinematic form while reaffirming her inextricable relationship with her mother, one which underlies much of the late filmmaker’s work. “All you have in life is time…with my films, you’re aware of every second passing through your body,” she once said during an interview. Similar to (and in close connection with) many of Akerman’s previous films, No Home Movie commands a rigorous, life-altering viewing experience as it beautifully outlines ideas of history, distance, memory and intimacy. —Chanel Kong