My Eternal Summer – Denmark

15-year-old Fanny and her parents have gone to spend their summer at a holiday home like they always do. But beneath the surface of their usual routines and traditions lurks an unspoken sadness – they know this will be her mother’s last summer. As they try to make the most of the time they have left together, the family carefully navigates between savouring the present and confronting the inevitable future.  

My Eternal Summer is a beautiful and deeply moving film. The portrayal of young Fanny, who has to say goodbye when she would rather look forward, is so specific that it makes an otherwise frequently described topic – illness and grief – feel authentic and moving in new ways. Through the portrait of the interaction between mum, dad, and teenage daughter in the family cottage, the debutant director Sylvia Le Fanu takes a surprisingly lyrical approach to the material. She insists that the time before death can be experienced as a mixture of banal day-to-day actions and waiting, all the things you never get to say, and grief without death having yet occurred. Le Fanu draws on her own experiences of bereavement and losing a loved one to cancer at a far too young age. The director’s personal experiences shine through clearly but not heavily from the first scene to the last.

My Eternal Summer displays impressive self-control and an understanding of human nature that is displayed in a story that could easily be claustrophobically depressing. Instead, it demonstrates lightness in the images and tenderness for the characters. The editing is not only realistic, but also elegantly suggestive. It exudes an unusual maturity and clear direction from a debut filmmaker. The film demonstrates that fiction can pose humanistic questions that are just as important as social or political ones, while also being complex and relatable. 

Fanny gets to know her mum as she says goodbye. In parallel, she gets to know herself as a young person and has to carry something heavy. Amidst this sadness, there is also hope, which the film conveys by way of a beautiful and optimistic ending. As you sit in your cinema seat, you are warmed by the little light in the darkness that Sylvia Le Fanu has given us with her film.

Sylvia Le Fanu graduated from The Norwegian Film School in 2020 and has a bachelor’s degree in Film and Media studies from the University of Copenhagen. She studied at the independent film school 18FRAMES, where she wrote and directed the short film Abu Adnan (2017), which achieved international recognition, including at Clermont Ferrand. The film was nominated for a Robert award (2017), as was her subsequent short film Amourteur (2020), which also won the main prize at the Odense Film Festival. The films won the Ekko Shortlist Award in 2017 and 2021 respectively. My Eternal Summer is Sylvia’s debut feature film.

Mads Lind Knudsen is a Copenhagen-based screenwriter who left his philosophy and maths studies at university to pursue film making. He graduated from the Norwegian Film School in 2020 and his first feature film – My Eternal Summer, co-written with his longtime creative partner Sylvia Le Fanu – made its debut at the San Sebastián Film Festival in 2024. Lind Knudsen employs a mosaic writing style, crafting scenes from vivid, fleeting impressions and observations, with the passage of time serving as the true narrative thread.

Jeppe Wowk is a Danish producer who graduated from the independent film school 18 FRAMES (2011-2013) and later from the Norwegian Film School (2017-2020). He loves working with the development aspect of projects and people, and the creative aspect of marketing. He has worked at the Danish company Adomeit Film based in Copenhagen from 2020 to 2024. Jeppe is currently working as a freelancer and is developing a television series in collaboration with SF Studios.

Main director: Sylvia Le Fanu
Main writers: Sylvia Le Fanu, Mads Lind Knudsen
Main producer: Jeppe Wowk
Production company: Adomeit Film ApS
Distribution company: Reel Pictures
International sales: Trust Nordisk
Original title: Min Evige Sommer
International title: My Eternal Summer
National premiere: 27.02.25
Total length in minutes: 105