The mother of Myrid Carten is like a ghost that appears and disappears again. At the beginning of her film, Carten describes seeing her mother in the centre of Belfast dead drunk with a bottle of wine in her hand. At times no one can find her, not even the police.
The daughter tries to reach her severely alcoholic mother through the camera lens. She captures the reality of a family with substance abuse problems and intercuts it with her art project and childhood home movies. In one video the children play drunk, in another a family feud.
A Want in Her is the impressive debut film of Carten, known as an artist. It shows what it takes to love a person with a substance use disorder: the filmmaker has previously had to put her mother into compulsory treatment, now she has to travel from London to Ireland to find her.
A haunted house, her mother’s childhood home, awaits at the destination. There the mother returns when she’s not drinking. Old video clips bring in layers of time and relatives who have already died. The camera occasionally strays to the ceiling line, adding to the sense of alienation.
The same atmosphere continues in the encounters between the mother and the daughter as both struggle with their own curse. The mother’s curse is alcohol, the daughter’s unconditional love.
Kaisu Tervonen (translated by Moritz Müller)
The mother of Myrid Carten is like a ghost that appears and disappears again. At the beginning of her film, Carten describes seeing her mother in the centre of Belfast dead drunk with a bottle of wine in her hand. At times no one can find her, not even the police.
The daughter tries to reach her severely alcoholic mother through the camera lens. She captures the reality of a family with substance abuse problems and intercuts it with her art project and childhood home movies. In one video the children play drunk, in another a family feud.
A Want in Her is the impressive debut film of Carten, known as an artist. It shows what it takes to love a person with a substance use disorder: the filmmaker has previously had to put her mother into compulsory treatment, now she has to travel from London to Ireland to find her.
A haunted house, her mother’s childhood home, awaits at the destination. There the mother returns when she’s not drinking. Old video clips bring in layers of time and relatives who have already died. The camera occasionally strays to the ceiling line, adding to the sense of alienation.
The same atmosphere continues in the encounters between the mother and the daughter as both struggle with their own curse. The mother’s curse is alcohol, the daughter’s unconditional love.
Kaisu Tervonen (translated by Moritz Müller)
The daughter tries to reach her severely alcoholic mother through the camera lens. She captures the reality of a family with substance abuse problems and intercuts it with her art project and childhood home movies. In one video the children play drunk, in another a family feud.
A Want in Her is the impressive debut film of Carten, known as an artist. It shows what it takes to love a person with a substance use disorder: the filmmaker has previously had to put her mother into compulsory treatment, now she has to travel from London to Ireland to find her.
A haunted house, her mother’s childhood home, awaits at the destination. There the mother returns when she’s not drinking. Old video clips bring in layers of time and relatives who have already died. The camera occasionally strays to the ceiling line, adding to the sense of alienation.
The same atmosphere continues in the encounters between the mother and the daughter as both struggle with their own curse. The mother’s curse is alcohol, the daughter’s unconditional love.
Kaisu Tervonen (translated by Moritz Müller)
Info
Rating
-
Production year
2024
Global distributor
Syndicado Film Sales
Local distributor
DocPoint Tallinn MTÜ
In cinema
2/6/2025