You Have No Idea How Much I Love You is a powerful and emotionally engaging documentary that will leave a mark on anyone who watches it.
The documentary follows the series of conversations between a mother (Ewa Szymczyk), her twenty-three-year-old daughter named Hana (Hanna Maciag) and their therapist (Bogdan De Barbaro) over a course of several therapy sessions across a few weeks. Cutting between Hana and her mother Ewa, the camera focuses on one person at a time, providing an insight on them as they reveal the inner conflicts within themselves and then cutting to the next person. This tight framework and repetitive pattern grounds the documentary, making the audience focus on listening rather than just aimlessly viewing as the characters come to terms with their strained and at times destructive relationship.
Though in reality and for reasons of confidentiality, genuine family therapy sessions could not be filmed and as such Ewa and Hanna are not mother and daughter, both actors drew from their own experiences without the use of a script. However the therapy sessions filmed were conducted by Professor Bogdan De Barbaro, an actual therapist. This sense of authenticity and vulnerability is incredibly powerful, with Ewa Szymczyk in particular standing out, delivering her role with a multitude of layers that seemed incredibly realistic and most importantly three-dimensional. Hanna Maciag also did an amazing her job. Her acting was more subtle yet just as powerful.
Whether it is the sheer rawness of the conversations, potency of the character’s emotions that translates through the camera even in silence or the sense of uncertainty and pain that transcends the screen and is familiar to anyone, Polish director Paweł Łozinsk (known for Birthplace and Sisters, SFF 200), provides an intense yet nonetheless beautiful portrayal of human relationships.
Łozinsk is able to touch some part, somewhere deep in viewers. The dilemma and conversations may seem foreign and not relatable for certain viewers yet the intensity of the feelings is something incredibly familiar. Never once does the documentary mention the acts that led to the two to come to the therapist nor the specific backstory that damaged the relationship in the first place. No, this is a film that explores how these characters accept their past and how these characters view themselves in the present.
These moments are the focus of the documentary and are carefully probed by the therapist rather than forced and melodramatic. The therapist does not necessarily serve a purpose other than to help these characters development, yet his role is significant. At times, it seems as if he is talking to the viewer themselves.
Ultimately, the film has a more subtle undertone that is reflective in its quality. As the title suggests, love is the focus of the film, but that is just only one aspect of it. Rather, You Have No Idea How Much I Love You realistically portrays humans at their most vulnerable and rawest moments.
It is definitely worth a watch.
You Have No Idea How Much I Love You is screening at the Sydney Film Festival.
