This filmmaker gets how hard it is to make a movie about mental health

In this episode of Q with Tom Power, filmmaker Sophie Romvari discusses her debut feature film, Blue Heron, a deeply personal and semi-autobiographical story about a young girl named Sasha navigating her family's emotional turmoil after her older brother, Jeremy, experiences a mental health crisis. Set in 1990s Vancouver Island, the film explores themes of grief, immigration, memory, and the limits of storytelling when dealing with trauma. Romvari reveals how the film emerged from her own experiences growing up in a Hungarian immigrant family, where her parents’ struggles with language, culture, and their son’s mental health shaped her artistic journey. She reflects on the fallibility of memory, the creative liberties taken in reconstructing events, and the emotional weight of portraying a sibling’s crisis without fully capturing his inner world. A standout moment in the film features real social workers responding to a fictionalized version of her family’s case, lending authenticity to the narrative. Romvari also shares the profound experience of screening the film for her parents, who were moved by its craftsmanship and emotional honesty. The conversation underscores the power of film as both personal catharsis and a bridge for collective understanding of mental health and family trauma.