BERLINALE 2020 - Golda Maria

70th BERLINALE FILM FESTIVAL

Father and son duo Patrick and Hugo Sobelmans’ documentary feature Golda Maria is an utterly fascinating and mesmerising piece. A thematically rich and intimate feature, Golda Maria follows the eighty-four-year-old titular character Golda Maria Tondovska, as she recounts the days leading up to, during and aftermath of the Holocaust.

Shot naturally and effectively in a one-camera home video set up in Tondovska's own home, the simplistic nature of this interview — shot over a couple of days in 1995 — is wonderfully effective at engaging the audience, by having a sense of comfort and accommodation as Golda sits on her living room couch. The comforting nature of the interview only reinforces the emotional weight of what Tondovska recounts. There is a form of relaxation and intimacy that effectively entraps the audience into an inescapable story that ravages the belief of the events in a harrowing complexity.

Only using relatively small moments of archive footage to create a narrative, Golda Maria leaves the audience to their own devices to visualise the terrors. A feat that, on paper, may not perhaps be the most influential aspect, but one that, after the fact, dives penetratingly into the memory long after the credits roll.

Watching Tondovska explain her emotional psyche is one particular element that fascinates. Her selfish acts are poignant, yet her self-neglect of staying in France and Germany to watch the Nazi's fall is incredibly profound. There is no concrete answer to that very question of ‘why?’ However, watching Tondovska explain her actions is all the more heartfelt and tender. Not to mention that Tondovska at many points, perhaps subconsciously, remains tight-lipped about her demons and instead relays the stories of those who were unable to tell them themselves — a sentiment that defines this picture as a brutally honest depiction of loss and grief.

Watching Tondovska recount multiple tormenting moments of terror and seeing her live through them once again in an unflinching delivery with harrowing detail in full force showcases not only how strong Golda is as a person, but also the power of retelling this story to the masses so that it will never happen again. This is a sentiment that helps balance Golda Maria as a piece which does not define itself solely as a holocaust piece but rather a memento for the Sobelmans to remember their history and legacy via their mother and grandmother.

Golda Maria is an emotionally breath-taking and captivating documentary that details the horrors of the Holocaust honestly and devastatingly. Superbly shot in an intimate set-up and delivered in a simplistic fashion, father and son duo, Patrick Sobelman and Hugo Sobelman deliver a stunning feature that hits the viewers emotional core in a crushing manner.