Nela and Mrs. Rose
A Croatian girl comes to England in search of opportunities and a better life. She finds employment as a cleaner for a wealthy eccentric Englishwoman who lives alone in a beautiful mansion. The two women strike up a friendship. Nela keeps Mrs Rose company and she in turn showers Nela with gifts. They become increasingly co-dependant. Nela lets the fairytale unfold in her head and daydreams of one day inheriting Mrs Rose's fortune. But then she discovers that Mrs Rose has been living beyond her means. She has lost her money and had to sell her house. Unable to come to terms with the reality of being evicted, Mrs Rose now turns to Nela to help 'save' her. Nela feels trapped. She must disentangle herself from her ties with Mrs Rose, but can she find a way to reclaim her freedom and integrity without doing harm to Mrs Rose?
PRODUCTION CREDITS
Director: Vesna Cudic
Producer: Camilla Bray Screenplay by: Vesna Cudic & Tena Stivicic
From sixteen films
About Vesna Cudic:
Vesna Cudic grew up in Croatia and has lived in the UK since 1992. She studied Film and Video at the Surrey Institute of Art and Design where she wrote and directed five short films including Virgin Birth, which won a Royal Television Society Non Factual Award, and Red Square, which won her a Fuji Film Scholarship. She went on to study at the National Film and Television School where she directed five short films. Her graduation film I'm Not Going has been screened at more then twenty film festivals around the world and was a finalist of the Kodak / BAFTA Short Film Showcase 2003.
Melanie Martinez, Vesna Cudic and Tena Stivicic on a trip to Cumbria
Vesna talks about working with Tena:
How have you found working with a co-writer?
VC: While I worked alone I went through different stages. Sometimes the writing went well, and it felt great to be writing, other times it was painful beyond belief. During one of those difficult periods Camilla raised the idea of working with a co-writer. I wasn't very keen, because I was writing a personal story that was also culturally specific. But then, coincidentally, I was put in touch with a Croatian writer, Tena Stivicic, with a view of working together on a different, Croatian project - an adaptation of her award winning play The Two of Us. This play was very different in terms of style and sensibilities, but I read Tena's other plays, and there was one that was about an immigrant community in London. I thought the play was excellent, and since my script was also about emigrants from Former Yugoslavia, I proposed that we could co-write my script. What I was finding difficult to achieve in my writing was the humour, lightness, the playfulness and sparky dialogue that would fit my young characters. I wanted it to be more fun. Tena helped with all of those things. She managed to create a vivid sense of life in an emigrant community, and the dialogue became very funny and culturally specific. She also helped a lot with dramaturgy. She was in Switzerland at the time, but I thought 'we are going to do this now!' - so I bought a ticket and went to see her. And we spent three days thrashing the story out, going back to the treatment, rewriting the step-outline. And then she wrote an alternative ending and it worked. It has been a great experience. She's made a huge contribution.
IWhat is the premise of your script?
VC: It's the ill-fated, mutually exploitative relationship between a young Croatian cleaner and a lonely 60-years-old Englishwoman, that breaks down once the Englishwoman is revealed not to be wealthy, and begins to rely on the young girl's help - in a complete reversal of power roles. It's a tragicomedy.
Are you working on any other projects?
Melanie (Martinez) is writing a project called Sunny Gardens which I hope to direct. I am also working on the adaptation of Tena Stivicic's play The Two of Us, which will be set in Croatia.
From www.initialize-films.co.uk
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