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HEI GAH

gOING HOME

A hybrid fiction road movie about two siblings longing for a home.

a film by

OLIVIA FREY

Tiff (23) and Zoé’s (25) story begins where their mother’s story ends – after her suicide, the two half-siblings are in their early twenties and with no parents. The desire for the unknown feeling of parental security and a stable home leads them on a journey through diffuse places of longing: they encounter questions about the feeling of belonging somewhere and experience hidden dimensions of siblinghood – always accompanied by the feeling of being lost in this far too big and far too complicated world.

GENRE

LANGUAGE

LENGTH

FORMAT

PRODUCTION PERIOD

TAGS

LOOKING FOR

Hybrid Fiction

Swiss-german

80 - 100 minutes

DCP / 16:9 / color

Spring 2025 - Summer 2027

Family, Sisterhood, Identity, Late-Coming-Of-Age, Road movie, Suicide, Trauma

Producers & Financing Partners

HEI GAH

HEI GAH is a late-coming-of-age road movie. It is a dense yet playful essay about the situation of two siblings that don't know the feeling of a secure childhood.

We follow them through a hot summer in Europe on their mission to scatter their mothers' ashes in a place she loved. The further their journey evolves the more they get carried away from their initial goal in finding their mother's beloved place and towards their own need of finding a place they can call home. A poetic voice over guides us through the inner journey of our main protagonist Tiff.

METHOD / STYLE

The protagonists of HEI GAH are chosen so that they play themselves, supported by staging interventions and a predetermined story. The script is tailored with and to the protagonists and develops out of them and their real-life experiences. Scenes are being developed during test shoots and dramaturgical cornerstones are set. Fully formulated dialogue is – apart from the voice over – only created when a certain choice of words is indespensable for the effect of the scene.

The cinematographic style displays the aesthetic of a journey, a hand camera following the characters, decisive moments of crooked images and an immersive flow of hidden edits characterise the style.

VOICE OVER

Tiff's voice over plays an important role in the film. It's supposed to be a kind of farewell letter to a mother who was incapable of loving. On the one hand, the voice over makes the impossiblity of saying your last words to someone you weren't able to say a proper goodbye to tangible. On the other hand, it gives us the opportunity to understand Tiff as a character and their complex relationship with their own mother. Tiff's inner life is intended to condense the film in a poetic way and explore the abysses of a difficult mother-child relationship. Furthermore the voice over explores the figure of the bad mother, which is often made taboo. On closer inspection however, she becomes a symbolic figure that points out the shortcomings of a patriarchal society characterised by inequalities.

MOTIVATION / INTENTION

I grew up as one of two daughters of a severely mentally ill mother. For me going home often meant fear, uncertainty, worry and a constant feeling of guilt. Over the last few years, in countless conversations with a wide variety of people, I have realised how many other people – whether with a similar story or a completely different one – share the same longing: to finally be able to "go home" somewhere. It has become clear to me that this cosy feeling of being at home is usually linked to an early childhood experience of security and safety, and all too often also to motherly love.

When my mother took her life in autumn 2022, my desire to make a film that playfully deals with the search of two parentless siblings for a home started to grow inside of me. The film revolves around topics such as the lack of maternal love in a patriarchal society and the effects of mental illness on parents from the children's perspective.

Cinematically, I am particularly interested in the characters' feeling of being lost and vulnerable as they cope in the world without the protection of a stable childhood. Their longings and the way they chase after them, as if after something irretrievable, are a central theme and are reflected in the filmic form of the road trip.

STATUS / DEVELOPMENT

The project is currently in the first phase of development. In close cooperation with the two protagonists, scenes are developed and dramaturgical cornerstones are set during test shoots. Funding for development (Stage I) has been granted by the Migros Kulturprozent Story Lab.

The project is currently looking for a suitable production company for the next stage of development.

TIMELINE

Spring 2025

Funding by Story Lab Migros Kulturprozent

Summer 2025

08/08/2025 - Pitching at Locarno Filmfestival

Autumn 2025

Submission for Fast Track Zürcher Filmstiftung

Autumn 2025

Test shoots I & II with the two protagonists

Winter 2025

Script Development 

Test shoots III & IV with the two protagonists

Winter 2025

Summer 2026

Filming

Winter 2026

Post-production

Summer 2027

Release

ABOUT THE DIRECTOR

Olivia Frey was born in 1991 and grew up in Zurich, Switzerland. She left her hometown at the age of 19 to live abroad. She worked, studied and lived in Berlin, Weimar, Brussels and Geneva. Olivia holds a Bachelor's Degree in Fine Arts from the Bauhaus-University in Weimar and a Master's Degree in Editing from the Master program "Master of Arts HES⁠-⁠SO en Cinéma" at écal/HEAD in Lausanne/Geneva.

Since 2020 she works as a freelance editor for short and feature-length movies, some of them screened and awarded in numerous national and international festivals.

Between 2017 and 2020 she co-directed two fiction shorts and directed a medium-length hybrid documentary. Olivia Frey currently lives in Zurich.

CONTACT

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2024 © olivia frey 

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