Syndicado Boards Myrid Carten’s ‘A Want in Her’ Following World Premiere in IDFA’s Competition (EXCLUSIVE)

variety.com:

Leo Barraclough International Features Editor Sales agent Syndicado has boarded Irish debut filmmaker Myrid Carten’s “A Want in Her,” which had its world premiere earlier this month in IDFA’s International Competition section.

In the documentary, Carten returns from London to Ireland to look for her troubled mother Nuala. Once a successful social worker, Nuala suffered a mental breakdown after the sudden death of her own mother.

She shuffles between rehab clinics, psychiatric hospitals, and occasionally the street. Her search takes her into a feuding family. “Intimate, surprising, and often darkly funny conversations with her mother and other family members reveal the trials of loving someone who struggles with addiction and madness,” according to a press statement.

Home videos from Carten’s childhood and recordings of video installations from her current work as an artist form a “playful blend” of fictional and documentary elements, which “compellingly capture the vicious cycle of care and rage.” Atmospheric Irish ballads about vagrant drinkers and dreamlike images of the neglected family home “conjure the cultural and relational roots at play.” In “fresh and inventive ways,” the film returns to a familiar, universal question: how can we be with those we love without losing ourselves?