Teenage Bianca feels ignored, especially by her mother who’s focused on her younger brother and his heart condition. It’s an especially hot day and everyone seems on the verge of exploding, but then her favourite actor appears in her living room… Belgian director Frederike Migom discusses her latest film Everyone’s Sorry Nowadays [+leggi anche:
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intervista: Frederike Migom
scheda film], screening in Berlinale’s Generation Kplus section, in which temperatures and tensions run high.

Cineuropa: The story takes place over the course of a summer’s day, but it feels like a week. It’s all so intense!
Frederike Migom: I wanted it to be intense because it’s really intense for Bianca. All these feelings have been lingering for a while and that day is like a pressure cooker for her. Being so sensitive about everything is exhausting, but she’s not alone in that.

In the summer, there’s extra pressure to be joyful. Sometimes, difficult emotions feel even worse because there’s no place for them. In the winter, at least you can curl up and sleep for three days. I wanted to play with the contrast between beauty and discomfort.

Bianca is able to create her own universe. Why did you include scenes which reflect that and which sometimes give the film a musical feel?
When I read the book [by Bart Moeyaert], I instantly knew that I wanted to make the film. Not much happens but there are some huge feelings. I don’t know about you, but there are days when I feel so excited about something, I feel like I’m about to explode. I think that’s what I wanted to convey. But I don’t like it when things feel gimmicky. I wanted to make a super-realistic film, because these thoughts and conflicts are real. It was important that the larger-than-life elements didn’t overshadow the emotional urgency of the story.

Can you remember what you liked about that story?
I recognised myself in Bianca. I know how it feels to be stuck with thoughts you can’t express. It really touched me. At some point, as a teenager, you start analysing things and wondering why people react the way they do. The relationships in your life can feel so complicated. It’s difficult to love someone yet be in constant conflict with them. Then there’s also the question of being honest and speaking up, and being understood. In my family, like so many others, we never really talked about our conflicts or emotions. You just hoped they would go away at some point.

Families can disappoint us, so we create our own heroes. But Bianca gets to actually meet hers: an actress she really admires.
Admiring heroes that don’t feel real is easy. When you meet the real person, though, there’s always going to be some sort of disappointment. They’re just people, they’re as flawed as everyone else. As a kid, you look up to adults who have the life you want – or who seem to be the kind of person you want to become. That’s why Bianca overanalyses everything when they meet. Then there’s that thing of teenage girls having crushes on people, not knowing whether they want to be them or be with them.

You really captured the way young people think. As we get older, we forget how it felt.
I haven’t forgotten. I think it has something to do with the fact that I never specifically wanted to make films for kids, but I found myself intrigued by younger characters. By exploring their minds, I also explored my own.

I’m fascinated by the process of growing up and becoming a fully-fledged person, and figuring out what kind of adult you’re going to be. I actually wonder whether I was ever really a child, because I spent so much time thinking about it. Maybe it also helps that I don’t have kids of my own? I don’t really know them, but we’ve all been kids and it’s really nice to go back to what it was like. In the end, being a kid isn’t so different from being an adult. You’re still learning how to interact with others and figuring out who you are.

Sometimes, I wish that films like mine weren’t just described as “films for kids” because it means adults might not watch them, but it’s actually really interesting to go and try to understand a teenager’s mind. I’m really praying this film isn’t just shown in kids’ film festivals. The writer of the book has managed to bridge that gap. Adults read his work and it’s taken very seriously.

When we think about our childhood, we focus on the good things. All the bad memories suddenly disappear. But that’s not really the case, is it?
So much happens between siblings and at school. School is like a mini war zone and parents don’t have a clue! When your heart gets broken for the first time – which, by the way, is something I would like to explore in my next film – it’s total agony. You don’t even know how to talk about it. But I really wanted people to understand that she’d be fine in the end. All these feelings are normal – it’s all right. It’s been a really tough day and she’s feeling like shit right now, but that’s life.