Heffernan, Valerie (2024) Adapting (to) Non-Motherhood: Ulrike Kofer’s Film What We Wanted (2020). Negotiating Non-Motherhood: Representations, Perceptions, and Experiences. pp. 221-238. ISSN 978-3-031-66697-1

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Abstract

Austria’s entry for the Best International Feature Film at the 2020 Academy Awards was a drama by director Ulrike Kofler called Was Wir Wollten (What We Wanted, 2020). Kofler’s film tells the story of a childless couple, Alice and Niklas, who decided to take a holiday to recover from yet another failed attempt to conceive via IVF. However, their plans for a restful break are disrupted by the family next door, whose beautiful children serve as a constant reminder of what is lacking in their life. The film is based on a short story by Swiss writer Peter Stamm, and this chapter focuses on how that written text was adapted for the big screen. In particular, it considers how Alice’s ambivalent stance towards motherhood, which is already present in Stamm’s narrative, is expressed in visual and cinematic form in Kofler’s film. This chapter argues that both the film and its narrative source text offer a more nuanced view of the story of childlessness and non-motherhood than that which is often presented in the media and society.

Item Type:	Article
Keywords:	adapating; non-motherhood; ulrike kofler's film; what we wanted; 2020;
Academic Unit:	Faculty of Arts,Celtic Studies and Philosophy > Research Institutes > Maynooth University Arts and Humanities Institute Faculty of Arts,Celtic Studies and Philosophy > School of Modern Languages, Literatures and Cultures > German
Item ID:	19189
Identification Number:	https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-66697-1_12
Depositing User:	Vidatum Academic
Date Deposited:	19 Nov 2024 10:09
Journal or Publication Title:	Negotiating Non-Motherhood: Representations, Perceptions, and Experiences
Publisher:	Palgrave Macmillan
Refereed:	Yes
URI:	Publisher
Use Licence:	This item is available under a Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial Share Alike Licence (CC BY-NC-SA). Details of this licence are available here

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