Director Aliona van der Horst was born in Moscow from a Dutch father and a Russian mother.
She made two documentaries about the marriage of her parents. "After the spring of '68" (2000) is about the beginning of their marriage. "Love is patotoes" (2017) was shot during the end. Her mother died before the documentary was ready.
"Love is patatoes" is about the youth of her mother (and the sisters of her mother, the aunts of Aliona). Growing up in the Stalin years there was suffering both physical (shortage of food) and emotional (shortage of safety).
As it turned out this childhood had psychological consequences and it created a generation gap too.
When her mother and aunts got children the Stalin years were over and the Brezhnev years were begun. Of course the mothers loved their children, but they had difficulties in showing this love. More accurately, they showed their love using things that were important when growing up, such as food. The title of the documentary refers to this phenomenon.
There was one scene that struck me in particular. Aliona is talking to her aunt Liza who tells her about the hunger she suffered as a child. She is not angry on Stalin however. He had to feed an army to beat the Nazi's, so he had to make a difficult choice. According to aunt Liza he made the right choice. When Aliona is about to tell the truth to her aunt, she is kicked under the table by her cousin. You don't deprive an old lady of the belief that her suffering was meaningful after all!
She made two documentaries about the marriage of her parents. "After the spring of '68" (2000) is about the beginning of their marriage. "Love is patotoes" (2017) was shot during the end. Her mother died before the documentary was ready.
"Love is patatoes" is about the youth of her mother (and the sisters of her mother, the aunts of Aliona). Growing up in the Stalin years there was suffering both physical (shortage of food) and emotional (shortage of safety).
As it turned out this childhood had psychological consequences and it created a generation gap too.
When her mother and aunts got children the Stalin years were over and the Brezhnev years were begun. Of course the mothers loved their children, but they had difficulties in showing this love. More accurately, they showed their love using things that were important when growing up, such as food. The title of the documentary refers to this phenomenon.
There was one scene that struck me in particular. Aliona is talking to her aunt Liza who tells her about the hunger she suffered as a child. She is not angry on Stalin however. He had to feed an army to beat the Nazi's, so he had to make a difficult choice. According to aunt Liza he made the right choice. When Aliona is about to tell the truth to her aunt, she is kicked under the table by her cousin. You don't deprive an old lady of the belief that her suffering was meaningful after all!
