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© 2024 Pavel Konyukhov |
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Mother and Son (Mat’ i syn) by Alexander Sokurov |
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Some time ago I saw another outstanding film by our contemporary director Alexander Sokurov. This film, “Mother and Son”, was made in 1997 and is the first part of his short series which was continued later with “Father and Son”. (I saw that film a couple of years ago and wrote a review on it; see below.) At first sight, the story of “Mother and Son” is very simple. The mother and her son live in their house somewhere in the middle of nowhere, outside of civilization, away from people. The mother is very ill and one suspects that we are seeing the last days of her life. The son is very caring for his mother and tries to comfort her. She is too weak to walk by herself and her son helps her to walk by holding her. This carrying/walking continues throughout the film. The film is very slow-paced and is made in the form whereby there is a frame for every shot which continues for a long time. Every shot in the film is like a canvas. (It reminded me of the movies by Peter Greenway.) The film compels the viewer to think about every nuance of the picture and the very words spoken by the characters, which seem trivial at first. This film is like music – after reflecting on those long shots, a lot of different ideas come into one’s mind. What was being expressed in this work: the son’s sublime love or his heavy burden, sacrifice or emotional dependence, pain relieved by embracing? This is a film of feelings, of atmospheres, of canvasses; it is a film which gives the viewer the chance to look closely into what is happening beneath the surface.
Pavel Konyukhov
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