Starring: Maggie Blinco, Glenn Shorrock, Belinda Giblin, Hoa Xuande
Distributor: Other
Runtime: 98 mins. Reviewed in Mar 2022
Reviewer: Fr Peter Malone msc
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A heart-warming story about Liebe, a former dressmaker, who reinvents herself after befriending a young Chinese fashion designer.
In fact, the title does not appear until the end credits – which means that we may be wondering all the way through what it actually means. The central character, Liebe (Blinco), is a talented former seamstress who decides in her later age to branch out again – a stitch in time to give her new life. She has spent 50 years in partnership with a musician, Duncan (played by musician and singer, Shorrock of the Little River Band). Duncan has always been ambitious but when his musical partner Justin (John Gregg) pulled out decades earlier he was left floundering, and has since taken out his disappointments on Liebe.
Liebe is a career highlight for Blinco after 50 years in film and television. Her character’s backstory is one of the Kindertransport, Jewish children transported by train from Germany to Britain just before WWII. She has been a patient woman most of her life, and a great support to her partner Duncan. Angry and bitter, Duncan is fired from his job and makes contact with his former musical partner Justin, but remains resentful of Justin’s wife, Christine (Belinda Giblin), who is a close friend of Liebe.
In the meantime, Liebe wanders the market stalls outside the church in Balmain, where much of the action was filmed. She encounters a young Chinese fashion designer and stallholder, Hamish (an engaging Hoa Xuande). They become friends and Hamish supports Liebe’s work. Her dresses begin selling, slowly at first and then becoming increasingly in demand.
The screenplay has a women’s liberation theme – Liebe’s liberation from patriarchal notions about her place, in the kitchen, at home and subservient to the husband. She gets a new lease of life, initially helped by Christine who is wealthy. There is a crisis, some unhappy memories of the past. Liebe walks out to find her own life, fortunately helped by Hamish and his Australian wife.
She begins a new phase in her life – renting garage space from a group of Chinese students, and building her dressmaking business, helped by Hamish who also relies on Liebe for drawing up patterns (though she does not quite approve of his more modern styles of dress design).
Given her background from World War II, Liebe does believe in forgiveness but finds it hard, though not impossible. –
A film that will resonate with older audiences, especially women who will identify in many ways with Liebe.
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