“Mother’s baby”, interview with director Johanna Moder

February 22, 2025

Johanna Moder: “my film is about the challenge of dealing with the expectations of motherhood and finding yourself”.

“Mother’s baby”, interview with director Johanna Moder Chiara Nicoletti

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Austrian screenwriter and director Johanna Moder presents her 3rd feature film, “Mother’s Baby“, in competition at the 75th Berlinale.

The film, described as very personal from the director herself, is a story about the hidden side of motherhood.

Moder follows the story of this woman, Julia, a successful conductor finally having the baby she has always dreamed of and feeling distanced from her son and the whole new life she is somehow forced to embrace.

“My film is about the challenge of dealing with the expectations of motherhood and finding yourself” explains Moder who declared that she chose to tell “Mother’s baby” as a psychological thriller since the the film plays with visual darkness and juxtapositions of beauty and pain.

In the role of Julia, the enigmatic German-Swiss actress Marie Leuenberger while in the villain role of awkwardly calm Dr Villefort, danish actor Claes Bang.

Plot

40-year-old Julia, a successful conductor, and her partner Georg are longing for a child when Dr. Vilfort offers them hope. Julia becomes pregnant after successful treatment at the fertility doctor’s clinic.
The birth does not go as planned and the baby is immediately taken away, leaving Julia in the dark about what has happened. When finally reunited with the child, Julia feels strangely distant. She begins to doubt whether it is really her child.

Written by: Chiara Nicoletti

Guest

Johanna Moder