Dante recently lost his grandfather, with whom he lived almost his whole life. Marina, her dear friend, decides to visit him to check if he is doing okay; Dante doesn’t have any other family members or friends beside Marina. Marina knows that Dante’s and his grandfather’s relationship was complicated because of his schizophrenia. But when Marina arrives at Dante’s door, the visit goes south.

Director’s Vision for ‘Stolen Moment’

My own life and experience inspired this short film. I moved to live with my grandfather after moving from Indonesia to Finland when I was 18 years old. I’ve lived four years with him, and he had schizophrenia and never agreed on any treatment for it in his whole life. At first, it didn’t bother me that much, but after a couple of years of living with him, it became hard. I loved him and wanted to take care of him, but because of his illness, he started to suspect bad things constantly, and he started to suspect and blame me for many things that went wrong or were missing in his house. At the same time, I went through one of the most challenging times in my personal life and struggled with depression; those were some dark days. My grandfather passed away in 2018, and one way to go through it was by writing a diary that inspired this short film; this was my way of dealing with his difficult passing with comedy.