In their daily lives, the ghosts of history intertwine.
DIRECTOR’S NOTES
“What does it mean to be a widow?”
Silence.
“Nothing! We do everything the same, but alone. It means being alone. That’s all!”
Once my mother became a widow, I watched her through her mourning and then her rebirth. During my visits, I saw her take over her husband’s vegetable garden. I saw her daily actions transform into rituals, in the secluded grace of silence and absence. This is how my gaze turned to these “ex-wives”: my mother’s friends and neighbors. I listened to the multiple and repeated stories of their former lives and romantic encounters woven into the fabric of everyday life, emerging from fragmented memories.
While the stories of the working class descended from Italian immigrants were carried by the bodies of men—by their voices, their images, their deaths—their wives were rendered invisible. Yet they too were part of this economic, social, and emotional reality.
A choral narrative, Veuves! immerses us in the intimacy of these women, in a sisterhood imbued with tenderness and a great deal of humor. With impressionistic touches, it summons the ghosts of the past. For one thing is certain: despite everything, they loved and were loved.
