IronWatcher’s review published on Letterboxd:
Watched in the cinema (185th visit in 2024)
What do you want to know about addiction?" Jenny (Emma Nova) snarls at her midwife Marla (Friederike Becht) when she finds out the truth about the mother-to-be. But Marla has experienced addiction first-hand, suffering from anorexia, sports addiction and binge eating. That's why the obstetrician doesn't judge her client. She treats her as an equal, almost like a good friend. Her attitude is similar to that of the movie: not wanting to know better, but wanting to understand. The title Vena alludes to the umbilical vein, the umbilical cord vein that supplies the unborn child with oxygen-rich blood and nutrients. The vein stands for bonding, not only between mother and child, but also between adults and perhaps even between audience and identification figure.
Director Chiara Fleischhacker's feature film debut is based on two opposing poles. On the one hand, her own experiences as a new mother, which flowed into the work on her own screenplay. On the other hand, she drew on two years of research: interviews with women in addiction facilities and in prison, with child and youth welfare workers, with parents of addicts and with therapists. The fictional character Jenny and her environment were created from various parts of real people.
However, the director did well not to leave it at the documentary level, but to add subtly dosed and therefore all the more effective poetic highlights to her character and the film as a whole. For example, when Jenny tends to her beloved orchids or when the couple transform their apartment into a starry sky with the curtains drawn. Lisa Jilg's camera takes a close look in many close-ups and detail shots. And in the midst of the film's raw, realistic look, she creates a love of detail that tells the opposite story to addiction and decay, namely that of a harsh tenderness for the characters.
"Vena" aims to draw attention to the fact that there are too few mother-child places in German prisons and that women's babies are taken away from them after birth if they are not given such a place. The film is carried by a convincing leading actress. Jenny has to find a way out of her addiction if she doesn't want to cause lasting damage to her daughter.
Not everything in this against-the-grain social drama is spelled out. For example, it remains unclear for what offense Jenny has to go to prison in the first place - and for how long. Even Marla, her helper and friend, doesn't ask. As with the question of addiction, Marla also stands for the discreet and respectful attitude of the film. The blank spaces allow you to come up with your own explanations - and thus empathize even more with the young woman who simply says about her past: "I messed up a lot". Thanks to the art of omission, the film also avoids the trap of sentimentality that usually threatens a story like this. Instead, when it comes to emotional issues, it sticks to the small details that come across so wonderfully unspent here.
Because Letterboxd doesn't give you the trailer, I do: youtu.be/0js-RXHkofU?si=sXlhnS-U65X-yPgK
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