Jennifer

The film is portrait of Jennifer – a friend of the filmmaker’s who is an enclosed Carmelite nun in a monastery in Ronda, Spain, where the community live out an ideal of work and prayer following the Discalced Carmelite Rule.The film had to be made by Jennifer and Alejandro Roman who is allowed inside the monastery as the community did not want to have filming by outsiders. Jennifer takes us through her chores and the cycle of the Office which is the clock of prayer of all monastastic life since the eariest foundations. In two interviews which were filmed at the visitor grille Jennifer talks about what brings her to this way of life.The interior of the monastery becomes a presence filmed in static shots in a structural way. The monastery is enclosed but the boundaries between inside and outside are porous through the sounds of the town and light and contact during visiting hours.The film gives us a rare access into enclosed life. What does it mean to live this life? What are the difficulties of this “sublime endeavour”?