News | FAMILY PORTRAIT

The documentary Las flores de la familia tells the particular story of a nonagenarian woman, Nivia (the filmmaker’s grandmother), who has to move out of the house she shares with her daughter, Alicia, when the young woman finds a partner. Nivia now worries about…her future. This singular plotline gives way to an interesting counterpoint between Nivia’s inner world and the reality of a family in the traditional landscapes of Montevideo. “I documented the family conflict throughout a year, trying to be a neutral witness, though being inevitably involved,” stated the director, Juan Ignacio Fernández Hoppe, at the film’s premiere.

From the very first moment, I felt as if a movie was rolling before my eyes. I have always defended it, almost as if it were a fiction. It had to do with that way of filming, of editing, the camera and, ultimately, the way of telling a story. I wanted to avoid by all means the documentary format of the interview. What happened during the shooting was that there were times when I felt a scene was good simply because it was telling me something like “this looks like a movie,’” added Fernández Hoppe.