The Cinematheque

The trauma of destructive mother-daughter relationships is dramatized, and familial love is stretched to the breaking point, in Zagreb-born documentary director Katarina Zrinka Matijević’s first fiction feature. Lina is a seven-year-old running away from an abusive mother. Nika is a rebellious 17-year-old yearning for freedom. Nikolina is a 40-year-old fitness instructor with attachment issues. The stories of these three characters, all from solidly middle-class situations, intersect; the connection between their respective names suggest that the two older women represent, symbolically at least, possible futures for young Lina. Tena Nemet Brankov, daughter of two prominent Croatian stage and screen actors, won an acting award at Croatia’s Pula Film Festival for her performance as Nika.