Author: Rita Kalnejais
Published: 2012
Synopsis: Teenage Milla is dying of cancer when she strikes up a friendship at Central Train Station with Moses, a junkie who helps stop her nose bleed. Their flowering relationship is watched with apprehension by her parents Anna and Henry, who have their own problems with substance abuse. Ultimately, he can pose no great threat in these final months, and we watch as those in Milla’s orbit try to deal with her imminent absence.
What moved me: strangely, in this deeply moving work it was the food that moved me most. Attention is drawn to the figs ripening on the windowsill so we notice that time is running out. There is a moment where Anna – this highly-strung, very-lost mother – chokes on sausage rind, and another where she peels a boiled egg very carefully before smashing it into her mouth whole. There’s something about the irrationality of grief – the arbitrariness of what it throws into relief – that strikes a chord with these brightly-lit moments.
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