Mother Vera
Synopsis
Revealed through spellbinding visual language echoing the rigid discipline of monastic life, we enter the enclosed, shadowy spaces of a convent outside Minsk. Sound and silence submerge us in the rhythm of the place.
At the monastery farm, two hundred men live in rehabilitation. They are a mirror to Vera’s old life. Faced with a life-changing decision, Vera must confront her past to find the freedom she desires.
Official Selection Visions du Réel 2024
Official Selection BFI London Film Festival 2024 - Documentary Competition
Details
- Year
- 2024
- Type of project
- Features
- Running time
- 94 min
- Director
-
Cécile Embleton, Alys Tomlinson 1st Feature
- Producer
- Laura Shacham
- Editor
- Romain Beck; Co-Editor: Cécile Embleton
- Director of Photography
- Cécile Embleton; Additional Cinematography: Alys Tomlinson
- Sound
- Leonardo Cauteruccio
- Colourist
- Romain Kedochim
Genre
Categories
Production Status
Production Company
UK, Belarus co-production
SheMakes Productions
Laura ShachamPage updates
This page was last updated on 12th May 2025. Please let us know if we need to make any amendments or request edit access by clicking below.
See also
You may also be interested in other relevant projects in the database.
Folk to Folk
Director: Saoirse Crean
Year: 2026
Led by renowned vocal coach Jennifer John, Folk to Folk follows a group of women in Liverpool who use traditional folk songs to build unexpected connections across cultures. As they learn and sing in Gaelic, Romansh, Boro and other languages, the sessions uncover shared themes that unite us. The songs rise like ghosts from the past, stirring memories, laughter and tears, and opening a safe space for the women to reflect together. “This project proves that music is a universal language. It allows us to feel, to be emotional, and when we do that together… that’s where the power lies” - Jennifer John
The Local
Director: Kim Hopkins
Year:
In an inner-city pub in Northern England, the lives of its regulars unfold through politics, love, loss and song, as a community holds on with quiet dignity in a world growing more divided and uncertain.
Lost Souls Swimming in A Fish Bowl
Director: Aneek Chaudhuri
Year: 2026
Lost Souls, Swimming in a Fish Bowl is a silent documentary about the invisible territories of depression, isolation, memory, and the fragile act of continuing to live. There are people who move through the world every day while feeling as though they exist behind glass. They work, walk, eat, sleep, smile, and disappear into crowds—yet remain suspended within an interior world that no one else can enter. The film observes these fractured states without explanation, diagnosis, or spoken testimony. Instead, silence becomes the language of the film. Through faces, bodies, empty rooms, urban landscapes, found footage, archival fragments, photographs, gestures, objects, and moments of stillness, Lost Souls, Swimming in a Fish Bowl enters the psychological geography of people who feel trapped inside themselves. The fish bowl becomes both metaphor and physical space: transparent enough to see the world outside, yet impossible to escape.