Extraordinarily poignant and a powerful documentary providing an incredible insight into one woman's epic struggle to survive WWII, Stalin's gulags and how she triumphs over impossible odds. In the end it's a love story of a daughter telling her mothers will to live and make a new life for herself and her daughter in a new land. I found the historical war footage, Russian gulags, interviews of her mother in Australia in the 1960's and finally as an old lady in her final days gave the story depth in terms of context and made it very compelling to learn about the WWII history, Stalin, survival and the documentary makers reconciliation and honoring her mothers strength and the love for each other.Highly recommend it.

Sophia Turkiewicz is an Australian filmmaker (Silver City, and lots of television work, etc) who has long been conflicted over her feelings regarding her mother Helen. When she was only seven, Sophia's mother left her at a convent/orphanage in Adelaide for a couple of years. For a long time Sophia was confused by this decision by her mother, which she saw as some sort of betrayal. But it was in her mother's twilight years, as Helen was slipping into dementia and was put into a nursing home, that she came to know her better. Turkiewicz became aware of the bitter irony that she was now abandoning her mother to some institution. In 1976 Turkiewicz, then a film student, attempted to make a film about her mother, simply called Helen. It was shot in black and white and on 16mm, but the project was unfinished as Turkiewicz never found the time to edit the raw footage. Turkieweicz revisits that old footage again, incorporating snippets of that film into this documentary. Sophia also draws upon extensive archival material and actual footage of the camps to give audiences some understanding of the historical context of her mother's journey. There are also lots of family photographs and moving interviews with her mother as she slowly teases out details about her experiences. Helen was born in the village of Oleszow in Poland, but during WWII she was one of 1.7 million Poles interred in Russian gulags in Siberia. Conditions were indeed tough there. After the war she was sent to a refugee camp is Lusaka in what was then Rhodesia. There she fell pregnant to an Italian prisoner of war, before eventually coming to Australia. But at that time there was also a stigma attached to unwed mothers, and Helen found it hard in her new country. Helen reluctantly left Sophia in the care of the orphanage while she went out to try and find a husband to provide for her and Sophia. Sophia travels back to the small village in Poland where her mother was born and raised until the population was sent off to the Russian gulags. She also follows in her footsteps to Italy, and later makes a moving and eye opening visit to the home of her biological father to meet her other family. This has given her a greater understanding of her mother's history. But the film becomes as much about Sophia's journey of discovery as it is her mother's story, and it proves something of a cathartic experience for her. Turkiewicz has been fascinated by her mother's experiences, and her sense of compassion and understanding have informed many of her own films, especially the short Letters From Poland, and the the 1984 AFI award winning drama Silver City, which explored the experiences of Polish immigrants arriving in Australia. In compiling this film, Sophia comes to understand the painful decisions that her mother had to make at the time, and slowly learns to forgive. Once My Mother is a labour of love for Turkiewicz. This is a poignant, bittersweet, intimate and deeply personal film that is also an insightful and moving exploration of the immigrant experience, displacement, reconciliation, forgiveness and the powerful bond between a mother and her daughter.