When her son was just two months old, Roja Pakari fell ill. After several medical tests, she was eventually diagnosed with incurable bone marrow cancer. Extended stays in hospital for treatment meant she slowly became a stranger to her little boy, who thought the hospital was her home.
Co-directed with fellow Danish filmmaker Emilie Adelina Monies, 'The Son and the Moon' is Pakari's love letter to her son, which she will be premiering at CPH:DOX, one of Europe's leading documentary film festivals, on March 18. Mixing her own footage with archives of her native Iran shot with a camcorder, the film chronicles the six years since the birth of her son and the diagnosis of her illness.
Pakari's journey through grief and learning to live in the present moment to see her son grow is a central theme of the film. She shares her experiences of surviving coma, her desire to not only survive but to live despite cancer, and how she reclaimed her place as a mother and a wife after coming out of the hospital.
In the film, Pakari addresses her son directly, narrating mainly in Danish but also in her native Farsi in the opening and closing sequences. She documents her Iranian heritage through archive footage shot on her regular trips back to Iran, emphasizing the importance of teaching her son about the country she comes from.
Despite her illness, Pakari emphasizes the importance of living in the present moment and making the most of the time she has. She hopes that the audience will take away from the film that it is a love story rather than a cancer film, made for her son to showcase their bond.
'The Son and the Moon' was produced by Sara Stockmann's Sonntag Pictures and funded with support from New Danish Screen and the Danish Film Institute in collaboration with TV2 Denmark. CPH:DOX, where the film will premiere, runs from March 13 through March 24 in and around Copenhagen.
