Director’s Statement

I wrote VICTORINE because I wanted to explore the intersection of contemporary Black American culture and traditional Haitian practices. I am interested in the dualities of the immigrant experience and the moments when cultures collide. I was born in the US to Haitian graduate students and have ping-ponged between the two countries and cultures throughout my entire life.

Black American culture has had an enormous impact on my voice as a filmmaker since I learned to make films with a company that prioritized narratives about the Black American experience. As I grow my practice, I am using several of those tools and techniques to tell the stories of my people, Haitian people. At this intersection, I met the character, Vicky, A Haitian-American dancer trained in American institutions her entire life who doesn’t know how to integrate her two identities into her everyday life—let alone her art practice. For her, the easiest way to cope is to separate the two entirely. But one year after her mother’s passing, she finds little to no peace inside of that isolation. Her mother’s home is exactly where she finds the answers she’s been searching for.

Victorine is about identity. It’s about finding the fullest expression of ones self by adapting and blending the different cultures that made you. We want to showcase this duality, the loneliness of it, and the richness of that fusion when it’s achieved. THIS FILM IS THAT FUSION. VICTORINE is a call to young Haitians growing up abroad who haven’t felt the need to accept their parents’ culture as their own. This piece is a prayer, calling on so many of our mothers, grandmothers, and elders who have passed. Begging them to surround us, to guide our steps to keep us close.

- Lunise Cerin