Also screens on Saturday, October 25 | 4:15 PM | BB
Filmmaker Livia Vonaesch spent seven years at sea with the ever-growing Swiss family Schwörers, but it’s hard to imagine how they made space for her on their crowded vessel. The parents, Dario and Sabine, set sail 25 years ago to conduct field research in the world’s most remote regions and inspire young people around the globe to save our planet. Along the way, their six children were born, each in a different corner of the world. Vonaesch films this like the adventure tale that it is, capturing the majesty and unpredictability of nature as well as the joys and thrills of life at sea. But what sets Home Is the Ocean apart is her eye for the contradictions at the heart of their little collective. For all the excitement of venturing out into the infinity of the ocean, and the wonderful intimacy of a loving family supporting each other on their journeys, it can also be tense, isolating, and claustrophobic when land disappears over the horizon. They spend 24 hours a day together in 20 square meters of living space. And their search for boundless freedom has its limits; a damaging storm forces them to reconsider their future excursions just as the children start to discover that there are other ways to live outside their floating home. Though their lifestyle may be unconventional, the challenges the family faces, and the way they pull together in difficult times, is deeply relatable and heartening. ~OO