Ruins
RUINS follows the filmmaker’s return to North Macedonia, where she sets out to restore a modernist monument by her late father. Once conceived as a symbol of collective freedom, the memorial site is now left to decay in a changing political and social landscape. As she navigates the practical and institutional challenges of its reconstruction, the process becomes intertwined with her own experience of loss, marked by the absence of three close family members. Through archival materials, individual recollections, and the monument's present-day reality, the film explores how personal grief connects to the quiet fading of a once shared idealism that defined an era. What begins as an effort to preserve a legacy gradually becomes a reflection on what can or cannot be restored and on how presence endures beyond loss.
RUINS follows the filmmaker’s return to North Macedonia, where she sets out to restore a modernist monument by her late father. Once conceived as a symbol of collective freedom, the memorial site is now left to decay in a changing political and social landscape. As she navigates the practical and institutional challenges of its reconstruction, the process becomes intertwined with her own experience of loss, marked by the absence of three close family members. Through archival materials, individual recollections, and the monument's present-day reality, the film explores how personal grief connects to the quiet fading of a once shared idealism that defined an era. What begins as an effort to preserve a legacy gradually becomes a reflection on what can or cannot be restored and on how presence endures beyond loss.