Nathan E. Lewis

The faces of the actors gaze upward searching for God in the midst of their sufferings, offering in the middle of an expertly and artistically directed and produced film a credible presentation and answer to the problem of pain and suffering in the world. Director of “Mother of Mine,” Klaus Haro, along with the screenwriters open the film with first time actor, Topi Majamiemi, 10 years old, looking up at the stars. He portrays the life of Eero, one of 70,000 Finnish children who were evacuated from Helsinki during the Russian invasion during WWII. Swedish families opened their homes to the children. Eero’s father died in the war and so his mother consented to send her only child, Eero to Sweden. The story reveals tragic personal life upheavals caused by war that many of us who have lived during times of peace would never imagine. Eero’s gaze is drawn to the sky several times as bombers fly over his home. In these scenes, Eero looks skyward with the normal curiosity and fears of a child during wartime. Director Haro’s insightful contribution is to add strategically placed scenes in which Eero and others looks upward in hope.
Eero is placed in a Swedish pig farming family living remotely by the seaside, where Eero escapes to gaze across the channel toward Finland hoping to return to his mother. Yet he is conflicted never knowing his mother’s true love for him as he bonds to his new Swedish family. His Swedish Mother Signe, played by popular Swedish actress, Maria Lundqvist, lost her only child, a six-year old daughter who drowned at the seaside two years before Eero came to live in her home. She is honest and expressive about her hateful feelings toward Eero as she continues to blame herself for her daughter’s death. In time Eero is key in helping her to heal and the two form a strong mother to son bond. Mother Signe often gazes out over the seaside haunted by her daughter’s death. She stands at the mail box searching the horizon for the letter carrier on his bicycle hoping that a letter from Eero’s mother will bring an answer to her questions about the problem of pain and suffering. Catharsis comes as she takes Eero to the grave of her daughter and finally tells him of her death and how she has come to understand this tragedy in light of her relationship to God. This scene is not presented with the triteness of numerous Christian presentations of faith and life in the midst of suffering. A Christian viewing this film may marvel at such a rich and natural expression of God in this present cursed world offered to us by a western European culture torn by war and related sufferings, largely departing from faith in a personal God in the wake of such tragedy. But Mother Signe refreshingly looks upward hopeful as she concludes her story at the graveside.
Years later, Eero, returns to the graveside, when he is invited to the funeral of his Swedish father, played by Michael Nyqvist, a brilliant and popular Swedish actor. Eero as an older man returning to Sweden for the funeral is played by longtime and beloved Finnish actor, Esko Salminen. At the graveside of Mother Signe’s daughter, he has a breakthrough experience where he finally understands the love of both his mothers. He is able to return to Helsinki to begin to talk with his mother for the first time openly and deeply about his childhood and their relationship. At the conclusion of the film, he is departing his mother’s apartment and he pauses to look up at the sky, his expression a subtle symbol of hope and rest.
I recommend this film, to say the least, and look forward to opportunities to discuss it with others online or face to face.