Housekeeping for Beginners is a found-family story that has been told countless times: it has an eternal power to it.
The outsider coming to find a place of safety and love outside the bounds of blood and traditional community is an immensely hopeful one for those of us that do not fit the mainstream mould. Such is the story of Housekeeping for Beginners, the latest film from Australian/Macedonian filmmaker Goran Stolevski (2022s Of an Age & You Won’t Be Alone).
Dita (Anamaria Marinca) is a social worker who long ago turned her large home into a sanctuary for a whole host of characters including; a handful of Romani lesbians, Dita’s old friend Toni (Vladimir Tintor) and Dita’s former client and lover Suada (Alina Serban) along with her two daughters.
The film opens in a joyous scene where Ali (Samson Selim), Toni’s latest lover, sings home karaoke with Suada’s daughters while we soon find out their mother and Dita are at the hospital. There is a complexity to the relationships that fill this house, stories that we’re not privy to, cultural and political and generational lines that crisscross the palms of these people. This is a messy world we’re stepping into, and it’s the performances that hold us steady through any looming questions we may have.
An effervescent glow fills Dita’s home, one that is absent in the outside world. The cinematography, by Naum Doksevski, is one of the great strengths of this film. There is a breadth and tenderness in which he captures these characters; the quiet conversations in the kitchen late at night, the stark chill of a doctor’s office and in the frenetic Roma-majority city of Shutka in northern Macedonia, where several of the characters are from. The camera is alive in every scene and feels like just another lost soul taking shelter from the storm.
The precarious balance that this group has found is tragically lost when Suada passes away and Dita takes on the role of mother to her two girls. Before this new position, Dita has felt like Atlas holding up the world, more matron than mother, and it’s where the real friction comes into play as they navigate the political and cultural barriers to adopting these girls.
There is a glorious specificity to Housekeeping for Beginners that makes it shine far beyond the usual found-family drama. It is a heartwarming and devastating story that is filled with some of the best performances from a film like this I’ve seen in a very long time. Across the board, each performer brings such humour, gravity, grace and dedication.
It is very heartening to watch director Goran Stolevski continue to carve out an artistically significant space in the Australian film industry, telling stories outside the cultural mould that has long been suffocating this industry. To watch a queer film where the characters’ sexual identity is not the be-all-and-end-all source of drama or conflict. It is certainly there, through the societal red-tape that prevents Dita from simply adopting Suada’s girls. But homophobia remains an element in the air, and not one that ever explodes into violence. Within the walls of Dita’s home, everyone is safe to be themselves, no matter how lost, and it is glorious.
Fun Fact:
Official submission of North Macedonia for the ‘Best International Feature Film’ category of the 96th Academy Awards in 2024.
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