MYA AKHINA

Recently in March, I directed a graduation film for the Bournemouth Film School as my final major project. The film follows a mother and daughter in 1960s and 1930s Japan as they discover (and rediscover) the events of the past.

In 1936, a young nurse (“Young Mother”) experiences the emotional devastation of sending her lover to war. Her world is defined by patriotic devotion, enforced resilience, and the human experiments which surrendered humanity in the name of science. Decades later, her daughter, referred to as “San” (“Miss”), lives an isolated and restrained existence alongside her ageing mother. While tending crops and constructing scarecrows, San uncovers fragments of a concealed past — letters, paper cranes, and a lock of hair. Each discovery prompts imagined visions of a life unlike her own, gradually allowing her to piece together a hidden family history shaped by war and sacrifice.

Set against the haunting backdrop of war and its aftermath, What Remains Of Calico Hill explores themes of memory, loss, generational trauma, and quiet resistance within systems of power. As the narrative moves gradually reveals a story of love lost through war, the film suggests that memories of the past, whether painful or comforting, are never truly erased. Instead, they remain suspended in time: watching, waiting, and hidden in plain sight.