Van Diem’s Tulipani world premieres at TIFF Dutch master: Hoyte van Hoytema Bringing Dunkirk to Holland Antoniak and Koole head for Toronto Rifka Lodeizen times two at TIFF

Issue #28 August 2017 Venice / TIFF San Sebastian / Netherlands Film Festival Index COLOPHON 4-5 An immigrant’s tale Urszula Antoniak 32-33 Boarding cargo Gijs Kerbosch is selected for TIFF and San Sebastian of Halal talks to SeeNL about the See NL is published four times per with her very personal Beyond Words co-production of Gilles Coulier’s Cargo, year by EYE International and world-premiering in San Sebastian The Netherlands Film Fund and is distributed to international film 6-7 Picture purrfect Jamille van Wijn­ professionals. gaarden’s feline-themed animation debut 34-35 Lighting up Locarno The strong Catastrophe is pawing its way to TIFF Dutch presence at August’s Locarno Editors in chief: Marten Rabarts International Film Festival (EYE), Jonathan Mees 8-9 Puppy love Ben Brand chronicles (Netherlands Film Fund) Executive editor: Nick Cunningham our digital age in Find This Dumb Little 36-37 New kid on the block Floor van Contributor: Geoffrey Macnab Bitch and Throw Her into the River Spaendonck is the new head of leading Concept & Design: Lava.nl, children’s fest Cinekid Amsterdam Layout: def., 10-11 Better together Leading Dutch Amsterdam Printing: mediaLiaison Printed on FSC paper production house Lemming Film 38-39 Kindred spirits This Autumn the © All rights reserved: presents two dynamic new EYE Museum will celebrate the sensory The Netherlands Film Fund and co-productions at Venice/Toronto and dreamlike works of Apichatpong EYE International 2017 Weerasethakul and Cao Guimarães 12-13 More vroom The Production CONTACT Sandra den Hamer Incentive now welcomes high-end TV, 40 Star profile Rifka Lodeizen, star of CEO EYE doc and animation series Disappearance by Boudewijn Koole and E [email protected] Marleen Jonkman’s Messi and Maud, 14-15 The ice queen cometh Boudewijn both selected for Toronto Marten Rabarts Koole is back with Disappearance, Head of EYE International E [email protected] selected for TIFF EYE International 16-17 Heading north Debutant Marleen PO BOX 74782 Jonkman tackles the raw subject of 1070 BT Amsterdam The Netherlands childlessness in Messi and Maud, T +31 20 758 2375 selected for TIFF Discovery W www.eyefilm.nl

18-21 Catching tulip fever Mike van Doreen Boonekamp Diem’s lavish and romantic Tulipani CEO Netherlands Film Fund E [email protected] opens The Netherlands Film Festival – and is Toronto-bound as well Jonathan Mees Communications 22-25 High flying Dutchman Leading Netherlands Film Fund Dutch DOP Hoyte van Hoytema talks E [email protected] to See NL about lensing Dunkirk for Netherlands Film Fund Christopher Nolan Pijnackerstraat 5 1072 JS Amsterdam 26-27 Epic benefits Kaap Holland The Netherlands T +31 20 570 7676 Film’s Maarten Swart talks about W www.filmfonds.nl bringing Dunkirk to The Netherlands

28-29 First among equals In We Margiela Dutch dochouse Mint Film profiles the rise of avant-garde fashion house Maison Martin Margiela

30-31 Under her wing Jaap van Heusden’s In Blue, about an air stewardess who strikes up an unlikely relationship with a young boy, opens Cover: Tulipani Mike van Films by the Sea Diem See page 18 Tulipani Mike van Diem See page 18

2 3 TIFF and San Sebastian Film Festival Beyond Words Urszula Antoniak An immigrant’s tale

Antoniak was in her early 20s when Antoniak first had the idea for she came to The Netherlands in the Beyond Words a decade ago. late 1980s, even though she was still She intended to shoot it in The enrolled at film school in Katowice. Netherlands and had even lined up “It was pretty obvious,” she a Dutch-Polish actor to play the responds when asked why she lead. In the event, she couldn’t raise decided to build herself a new life the financing. Now, ten years later, Photo: Maciej Zienkiewicz away from Poland. “I just couldn’t she has completed the project Urszula Antoniak stand the [political] climate there. – but has shot it in Germany. It was communism still, a bastard The film stars Jakub Gierszał, a Urszula Antoniak acknowledges version of communism – the last charismatic young Polish actor who that her new feature, Beyond years of a system that everybody was born in Cracow but grew up Words, about a successful knows is not working.” Her father between Germany and Poland. young Polish lawyer living in was a communist and her mother The lawyer’s father is played by Berlin, has a strong was in Solidarity. That meant the Andrzej Chyra, a hugely respected autobiographical undertow, tensions in the country as a whole cinema and stage actor. writes Geoffrey Macnab. were reflected in her own home. “There were quarrels on a daily basis.” In the decade since she first wrote Like the lawyer in the film, selected the screenplay for Beyond Words, for San Sebastian and TIFF Contemp­ Coming to The Netherlands, the tone of the project has changed. orary World Cinema, Antoniak left Antoniak relished the blast of Originally, it had a ‘feelgood’ factor. her homeland to head west. She too freedom. She could buy whatever Now, it is much more harrowing in has become very successful with a books and music she wanted – or its depiction of the immigrant’s string of award-winning features was able to afford. Nothing was situation. The young lawyer is highly behind her (Code Blue, Nothing banned. If she wanted to read successful but he has had to Personal) that have screened at Celine’s Journey To The End Of The become ‘a bit of an actor, a shape numerous international festivals Night, nobody was going to stop her. shifter,’ and his connection with his and sold to many countries. She could step on a train to Paris father has become very strained. without any interference. “It was a In Beyond Words, supported by the life free of politics.” Antoniak’s own relationship with Netherlands Film Fund, the lawyer her homeland has also changed. is visited by his father, but despite Eventually, Antoniak enrolled in The Law And Justice Party is now in their blood ties, it’s as if the two film school in The Netherlands. government and, to her dismay, the men are living in different worlds. The approach was very different country has swung to the right. They struggle to relate to one from that in Poland and altogether “What is in Poland now is beyond another. “This is like the primal more pragmatic. Whereas Polish words. The conflict there is just the scene for any immigrant, when you students were all talking about the tip of the iceberg of the many are visited by your parents from the vision and beauty of Tarkovsky from conflicts of the past that were never “The Dutch ‘me’ became old country,” Antoniak explains of the day they arrived, the Dutch were resolved. Politically, people are very different from the the new raw feelings her film far more focused on simply scared. They don’t know what the Polish version of me” exposes. An immigrant, she mastering their craft. “The new future will bring. Whenever I go to continues, becomes someone else, version of me, the Dutch ‘me’, was Poland, I am sad, I am angry and a different version of the person very different from the Polish I feel helpless. So I return to

Photo: Olaf Tryzna who left home. version,” she jokes. Amsterdam, where I belong.” Director & script: Urszula Antoniak Production: Opus Film (PL) Co-Production: Family Affair Films (NL) Sales: Global Screen

4 5 Toronto International Film Festival Catastrophe Jamille van Wijngaarden Picture purrfect

a larger than life world with larger Each film is screened before a major than life characters. And I like release at Pathé cinemas across comedy, especially dark comedy, The Netherlands. Catastrophe will so it was a bit logical. In animation play before Spiderman Homecoming. everything is possible, so I wanted Past Ultrakort-funded films include to go further than you can in a live the Academy Award shortlisted action film. For me that was the film A Single Life by Job Joris and most fun part, and I could definitely Marieke. Jamille van Wijngaarden explore the darkest depths of my humour.” “We are very proud that one of the She may be better known as a short animation films, made within live action director but Jamille After receiving Film Fund support, our Ultrakort programme is van Wijngaarden’s animation Van Wijngaarden worked on selected for TIFF,” enthuses Dorien debut Catastrophe, backed by character design and blocking in van de Pas, head of New Screen NL the Film Fund’s Ultrakort November 2016 and modeling in at The Netherlands Film Fund. scheme, has been selected for January 2017 before three weeks of “It is a project made by Kepler Film, Toronto Short Cuts Competition. intense and very detailed animation. a young and ambitious team, She talks to Nick Cunningham. “The difficult part for me was the coming from fiction to animation blocking, when your characters are for the first time. Together with The idea for the animated pre-defined as blocks. It was Storm Postproduction, their Catastrophe only came to Jamille difficult to see their eventual technical partner, they succeeded in van Wijngaarden in August 2016. movements, how fast they walk, making a very energetic, vivid and A mere year later her madcap and how fast they talk, but I had a great adventurous trip set in one room audacious 2-minute short film team of animators and post- – and played within a very short world premieres in Toronto. production producers around me period of time. They even made it in As reminiscent of 3D Spongebob as who got me through it all and helped 3D, the first time for a film in this it is the classics of Tex Avery and me with all the key decisions.” programme. Through the initiative Chuck Jones, her story of a cat who with Pathé these shorts are able to falls in love with a caged bird seeks “Animation was a whole new reach out to large audiences.” to questions our stereoptypical process for me,” she adds, perceptions of standard feline/avian “Normally you work with actors and A busy commercials director, Van relationships. In the process, much you are confident you will find your Wijngaarden is also working on a mayhem and violence ensues and, way on the set and in the editing. 45-minute screenplay for Kepler as happens in such circumstances, But in animation you have to make Film (working title: Tarantula) that “In animation a grand piano tethered to a rope a lot of important decisions she hope will receive One Night everything is possible” ably serves to dispatch one of the beforehand, such as how long this Stand backing from the Film Fund animated protagonists to the afterlife. shot should be in the edit, as every [and other partners] for broadcast frame costs extra time and extra in 2018. “It was a such a great “As this was my first animation money in the end.” process working on an animation I was curious about how to write a film, so I would definitely want to script for it, and how to direct it,” The Ultrakort scheme, run by the work on another in the future,” comments Van Wijngaarden. Film Fund, Fonds 21 and Pathé, she underlines. “I would also like to “That was new for me. Normally in invests a total of €200,000 per year make a feature that combines live my live-action films I like to create in four 2-minute animations. action with animation.” Director & script: Jamille van Wijngaarden Production: Keplerfilm (NL) Festival distribution: Some Shorts

6 7 Warsaw International Film Festival Find This Dumb Little Bitch and Throw Puppy love Her into the River Ben Brand

Beker and Sabine Veenendaal examples of people whose lives who eventually took the film to were thrown into turmoil because Submarine. of videos they had uploaded.

The screenplay for Find This Dumb The director explains that the film is Little Bitch… was developed by as much a coming of age story as it Brand and his co-writer Ilse Ott at is a morality tale about the dangers “He was intrigued as the Binger Filmlab (now closed). of posting something on the to whether a cinema Ben Brand They wanted to explore just why the internet. “I just had a private audience would react girl had behaved with what seemed screening in Paris. After it, a lot of with the same disgust Geoffrey Macnab talks to Ben like wanton cruelty. In their film, people came to me and said this Brand about his inflammatory Remco (15), his father and his really reminds me of their own and hostility” new film which brilliantly younger sister Lizzy (13) make youth. This, for me, is one of the chronicles and dissects our money by selling puppies that most important themes of the online digital age. they’ve illegal imported. Remco, film… growing up.” He cites Andrea lonely and unhappy and desperate Arnold’s work, especially Fish Tank, It was a video posted on the web in to make friends, is the one who as an inspiration. Brand is also a big 2010 that caused instant outrage. posts the fateful video of his sister. fan of Nicolas Winding Refn’s raw A teenage girl was shown on camera and abrasive triology of Pusher tossing live puppies into the river. Brand recreated a near identical films. He shot in freewheeling, The online community reacted with version of the original video posted improvisatory fashion. Most of the disgust. “Find this dumb little bitch online, with the key difference that young cast had never acted before and throw her into a river,” was the the girl wasn’t throwing a real puppy (although Nino den Brave, who response from viewers as the video into the water. He was intrigued as played Remco, had previously went viral. to whether a cinema audience appeared in movies). would react with the same disgust Young director Ben Brand saw it and hostility as those who had Find This Dumb Little Bitch… isn’t and followed the subsequent watched the original film online. intended to be “a hard, nasty, controversy. As the hunt began in The film, developed within De depressing film.” There is humour earnest, the web community tried to Oversteek scheme, was made for TV and redemption thrown into the work out where the girl was from. but it was always the director’s hope mix too. The director isn’t trying to Was she Swedish or American or that it would find a cinema audience excuse the behaviour of the girl who Bosnian? No-one was quite sure. elsewhere. It was broadcast earlier threw the puppies in the river or to An old woman came forward, this year in The Netherlands and is judge her, but he is asking questions claiming to have rescued puppies now set to have a long festival life about why she did it and how she from the river. Then the girl’s family with slots already confirmed at ended up becoming such a pariah. posted another video apologising various autumn events. Everyone tends to do stupid things for her actions and explaining that in their youth. If they’re lucky, they the puppies were sick. “When we started developing this are given the chance to learn from project, more and more of these their mistakes. That doesn’t happen, Gradually, Brand began to think kind of stories surfaced,” says though, if the mistakes are uploaded about making a feature film which Brand, pointing out one reason why and preserved for everyone to gawp would take the incident as a starting festivals were so keen to have the at on the internet. “It harms you for point. He met producers Jeroen film. There were many other the rest of your life,” warns Brand. Director: Ben Brand Script: Ilse Ott, Ben Brand Production: Submarine Film

8 9

Lemming Film at Venice/TIFF Better together

an officer of the Spanish Crown is a friend and colleague of waits for a letter from the King Lemming founder Petit – they met granting him promotion, but the over a decade ago at ACE. Bellaïche letter never arrives, so he therefore admired director Khatami and the decides to join a hunt to find both a script, and wanted the film to be dangerous bandit and his own co-financed by The Nether­lands. sense of destiny… The film world- This was possible via Lemming’s premieres at Venice before successful application for €50,000 Leontine Petit Eva Eisenloeffel screening in TIFF Masters. HBF+NFF funding. “Through this type of collaboration there is always Lemming Film is in the co-pro Rei Cine and Lemming Film previously exchange of experience and advice ascendant again with two films at co-produced on Jasmín López’s between producers – with the Hubert Toronto/Venice 2017. SEE NL Leones (2013). “That was great, and Bals Fund we could follow exactly speaks to CEO Leontine Petit we have been talking about when to what the production needed with­out and producer Eva Eisenloeffel. work together again ever since. necessarily having to ensure technical Benjamin Domenech (Rei Cine) told Dutch involvement,” says Petit. When asked to list the features of a me about his collaboration with successful co-pro in order of priority, Lucrecia, whose work we all love, Lemming’s influence on a film is the pair answer without hesitation. and then it all fell together. It is a never solely financial. “We always First comes the producer (one whom fantastic project script-wise and we read and discuss the script at an the company has known for a long found a good way for it to have serious early stage before we apply to the time or is confident of having a long Dutch involvement,” says Eisenloeffel. Film Fund, and mostly there is a term future relationship with), then Director Martel came to The Nether­ period of re-writing before we apply the director and finally the script. lands with her DOP Rui Poças for – and then, when we watch the the grading. In addition the visual edits, we get together to suggest “This was the case with In the Fog effects on the period film were improvements,” Petit comments. (Sergei Loznitsa) or Vivan las created in post-production by Film­ “Also, when the DOP comes from Antipodas (Victor Kossakovsky),” more in The Netherlands. Filmfreak The Netherlands that will mean Petit stresses, although she could will handle the Dutch release. there is already a very strong Dutch have just as easily cited Yorgos creative involvement. It is the same Lanthimos’ The Lobster, the In Alireza Khatami’s Oblivion Verses, with editing or grading.” upcoming Monos (Alejandro selected for Venice Orizzonti Landes, Alexis dos Santos) or a host Competition and TIFF Discovery, an “However much these projects may of other co-productions. “Producer, elderly caretaker of a remote morgue benefit us, we are always proud that director, script. If the holy trinity discovers the body of an unknown the main producer allows us to join makes sense we pretty much always young woman. Evoking memories the film as these co-productions are “Producer, director, know it will work. But I must stress, of personal loss, he embarks on a made by great teams that we love script. If the holy trinity of course, that we always keep our magical odyssey to give her a proper and respect,” Petit makes clear. makes sense we pretty minds open and are not locked just burial with the help of a mystic grave­ “We support the main producer much always know it into existing collaborations.” digger, an old woman searching for however we can. If they feel there is her long-lost daughter and a hearse some­thing that they want or need in will work” In Lucrecia Martel’s Zama, co-pro­ driver tormented by his past. order to get the film made, then we duced with the Argentinian Rei Cine The film is produced by House on are always determined to help.” and made with Film Fund support, Fire (France), whose Fred Bellaïche Nick Cunningham Oblivion Verses Director: Alireza Khatami Script: Alireza Khatami, Dominique Welinski, René Ballesteros Production: House on Fire (FR) Co-Production: Lemming Film (NL) – Leontine Petit, Eva Eisenloeffel, Endorphine Production (DE), Quijote Films (CL) Sales: Urban Distri­ bu­tion International 10 11 Film Production Incentive More vroom

The much lauded Netherlands The first deadline for TV series- This amounted to €42 million in Film Production Incentive, which oriented applications (offering up rebates, which equated to €199 launched Summer 2014, may to 30% cash rebate on Dutch million in production expenditure prove even more attractive to production spent) will be set for in The Netherlands. Put simply, Dutch and international producers early November 2017, with results to every euro granted by the Incentive later this year after the launch of be announced later in December. Scheme converted to Dutch spend a pilot rebate scheme for high- Another three deadlines will be of €4.77. What’s more, the Incentive end TV drama, documentary and scheduled in 2018. The total was shown to generate rising animation series. Additionally, amount earmarked for cash rebates confidence among Dutch the cash rebate for film projects for TV series will be €10 million. production entrepreneurs, and will increase up to 35%. Film to boost expectations of growth Fund CEO Doreen Boonekamp The Fund also responded to pleas within employment and economic tells all to Nick Cunningham. from the local and international activity. industries to raise the cash rebate The redrawing of the Production allocated per project, currently In 2017 a further 36 projects have Incentive’s remit comes in response capped at €1 million. This will rise so far received rebate support, to industry demand, both within to €1.5 million. The scheme will amounting to more that €9.6 and beyond Dutch borders. When, also open up for features with a million. These productions are earlier this year, a report on the production budget of 600,000 euro expected to generate a further €43+ Incentive’s results since its 2014 million in production spend. launch was published, it was obvious that news of its effective­ness “The international International productions such as had spread, both geographically competitiveness of Dunkirk by Christopher Nolan and and to the broadcast sectors. The Netherlands is Brimstone by Martin Koolhoven further boosted by have received Incentive support in “You can tell from the share of inter­ the past. The latest round saw national productions that came to modifying the scheme” the first cash rebate granted to an produce here, which went from international co-production 10% in 2014 to 26% in 2016. From between China and The Nether­ the start we also had numerous or more (currently only features lands: Dead & Beautiful by director requests from foreign and national with a minimum budget of David Verbeek. producers if there are possibilities €1 million can qualify). to apply for TV series, so we always “Moreover when you spend a “This was, of course, one of the knew that there was a strong certain level on digital production major aims of the scheme, to interest in it,” Boonekamp stresses. costs for film productions, or if no increase the attractiveness of the other public funding from the Netherlands to international “So now it is time to catch up with Netherlands is part of the financing producers to come make their films territories like Germany or the UK plan, producers can now get up here with Dutch partners, and to that have extended their incentive to 35% cash rebate,” Boonekamp make use of the excellent facilities schemes, particularly regarding adds. and the professionals based here. high-end TV series, which are of The international competitiveness increasingly high interest to both Between July 2014 and the end of The Netherlands is further professionals and audiences,” of 2016, 181 films benefitted from boosted by modifying the she adds. Production Incentive rebates. scheme,”Boonekamp affirms. Samuel L. Jackson in Amsterdam in The Hitman’s Bodyguard Supported by NL Film Production Incentive Still: Patrick Hughes

12 13 Toronto International Film Festival Disappearance Boudewijn Koole The ice queen cometh

pictures, celebrating birthdays or emotion would be suppressed and anniversaries. Instead, her lens was the mourners would get on with turned on seemingly ‘ordinary’ their lives as soon as possible. moments. That has changed. Now, when someone dies, there is likely to be There is very little that could be wine and speeches. People will give described as ‘ordinary’ about full vent to their grief. Disappearance. This is a film in Boudewijn Koole which death is a constant and In the film, the mother is a brilliant looming presence. Roos is an concert pianist. That is one reason You won’t find many films impulsive and passionate woman. why there is a distance between her made in a more remote setting We see her riding on a dog sleigh, and her daughter. Dedicated to her than Boudewijn Koole’s fishing through a hole in the ice, art, she didn’t always have the time Disappearance, selected for TIFF dancing in the snow, having sex. to be a good parent. Contemporary World Cinema, She also spends time with her writes Geoffrey Macnab. precocious teenage brother in Koole describes his two leads, saunas or beneath frozen waterfalls. Lodeizen and de Brauw, as his Koole shot his enigmatic drama in She is relishing and enjoying every­ favourites among Dutch actresses. Finnmark in Norway, a snowbound day moments but is all too aware Their faces, he suggests, are “land­ wilderness where (as the director that these moments won’t last. scapes in which it storms, and then puts it) “you can walk for 200km the sun comes out.” You can read the without a road… it’s one of the only Koole worked on the screenplay drama in their expressions, regard­ places in Europe where you can go with Jolein Laarman, who also less of what is written in the script. to and walk away from the world co-scripted the director’s 2012 and disappear.” feature Kauwboy. They went There is something very seductive together to a house in Sweden to about the icy world in which Roos Roos (Rifka Lodeizen) arrives in this complete the script. In creating the finds herself. As Koole points out, frozen wilderness to visit her mother character of Roos, Laarman drew on visitors to the region are frequently (Elsie de Brauw). There is tension her own experiences as a leukaemia warned that freezing to death is not between the women and Roos has survivor. She had kept diaries during painful. Sometimes, bodies are some very disturbing news to share. her illness and acknowledged there found of people who’ve undressed were moments when she just because it felt so warm. The initial inspiration for wanted to disappear. She’d be in a Disappearance, produced by The Film group with her friends and family “There are all sorts of warnings to Kitchen with Film Fund support, and would suddenly have the feeling keep your feet warm, to keep your came after Koole came across In that she was apart from them; that hands warm. You don’t feel it when The Shadow Of Things, a book and they were fine without her and it was your feet freeze. It starts to be nice, “Their faces are like exhibition by photo­grapher Léonie time for her to go. even. You lose a bit of energy and landscapes in which it Hampton. This chronicled the year you start to fall asleep. Traditional storms, and then the that Hampton spent with her mother. Growing up in a Protestant tradition stories warn you about the ice queen sun comes out” Koole was fascinated both by the in The Netherlands, Koole who comes when you fall asleep. ‘super intimacy’ of the pictures and remembers death being treated in a She seduces you… if you go with her, by the moments they captured. very matter of fact fashion. Funerals you will die. You’ve got to stay These weren’t conventional family would never last long, displays of awake, to start walking…” Director: Boudewijn Koole Script: Jolein Laarman Production: The Film Kitchen (NL) Co-Production: Sweet Films (NO) Sales: Pluto Film

14 15 Toronto International Film Festival Heading north Messi and Maud Marleen Jonkman

her partner Frank. She decides to different ways of working. We Dutch head to the warmer north by any wanted to be prepared and tried to means necessary, whether by ferry, make endless breakdown sheets, bus or hitch-hiking. En route she but the Chilean crew really dared to meets a small boy nicknamed Messi improvise and trust that everything whom she liberates from a drunken would be fine. That was very and violent father. Together they inspiring. We shot with a very small develop a delicate and vital crew, without light, wardrobe and Marleen Jonkman surrogate mother/son relationship art department, and that created a which fortifies them against the lot of flexibility and freedom to Debutant Marleen Jonkman’s enormous emotional upheavals improvise with the actors. I really Messi and Maud (Dutch title: they will experience before the enjoyed that way of working, to let La Holandesa), selected for film’s end. The film is supported go of control and to really trust in TIFF Discovery, is made from by the Netherland Film Fund and the moment.” a personal script by first-timer is the first feature from Danielle Daan Gielis. The director talks Guirguis’ Smarthouse Films. Surely a road-movie that entails a to Nick Cunningham. search for emotional equilibrium “Rifka is an emotionally intelligent could be filmed anywhere, and It is rare to find a film in which the and intuitive actor – in the casting certainly not distant South America. inability to bear a child is presented she was instantly Maud. She’s a very Not so, says Jonkman. The dramatic with such raw and uncompromising analytical person, who wants to landscapes and the shift from the intensity. But Messi and Maud is understand every word in the screen­ freezing Patagonian climes to such a film, loosely charting play, but when she plays, she stops Chile’s near-equatorial north play as screenwriter Gielis’ existential (and thinking and becomes super vulner­ metaphor for Maud’s emotional solo) odyssey from the southern tip able and intuitive,” comments journey, she stresses. “Nature helps of Chile to its north, little by little Jonkman of her main cast. her to heal and to let go, it’s almost coming to terms with the prospect like a character in this film. I think of a childless future. “I was also very lucky to finally find that was something that Daan Cristóbal, the boy who plays Messi. experienced herself on this trip, and As soon as director Jonkman read Other boys were too sweet, too shy it all came together in her idea to the script she understood the or too ambitious. Cristóbal was the make a film. I also went there alone emotional dilemma at its core, and opposite. A street-wise kid, without to make this 4500 km journey, to wanted to be involved. “I am 37 now much discipline, but with a great experience what the character of and I would love to be a mother. sense of drama. He easily under­ Maud is going through. Also, there I recognize this immense desire stood what he was playing. It all starts is a difference in mentality between that’s not fulfilled,” she says. “It can with casting the right people to be Dutch and Chilean people, and all be really hard to accept that it’s able to create such a relationship.” her encounters help her to let go.” something you cannot control and “When Rifka plays, I can easily imagine it becomes an Jonkman had to adapt early to the “For me it is not just a film about she stops thinking and obsession.” differences in approach of her Dutch wanting to have a child or letting go becomes super vulnerable and Chilean crews. “Not only were of that desire. It isn’t just about and intuitive” The film stars Rifka Lodeizen as we sometimes lost in translation children, it’s a spiritual journey Maud who, while on a hiking [she initially found Chilean Spanish about loss and love,” Jonkman holiday in Chile, walks away from almost impenetrable], we had concludes. Director: Marleen Jonkman Script: Daan Gielis Production: Smarthouse Films (NL) Co-Production: FATT Productions (NL), Leitwolf TV-und Filmproduktion (DE)

16 17 Netherlands Film Festival opening film and TIFF Tulipani Mike van Diem Catching tulip fever

Gauke’s disappearance and with the Italian star, who played opposite help of the grown-up Anna, who is Daniel Craig in the Casino Royale recently returned from Canada, he and Quantum of Solace, was soon discovers what really happened. impressed by the complexity of the role he was asked to play. “[At first] The film, directed by Mike van Diem he thought he’d have to – yet again – (Character) was originally slated to go through the usual routine of be made by another Dutch Oscar playing the stereotypical Italian cop. Mike van Diem winner, Marleen Gorris (Antonia’s But by the afternoon, he began to Line), but she had to leave the realize that not only the film, but his Academy Award-winning Mike production in October 2015. Even role, was a lot more playful and van Diem’s latest opus Tulipani, though some scenes had been shot, intelligent than he was used to. Love, Honour and a Bicycle, Van Diem was unable to join the There was more asked of him than selected for TIFF and The production until November 2016. usual, and he liked that. The next Netherlands Film Festival However, in the intervening period day, he enthusiastically pulled out (opening film) is a lavish, he was able to take a fresh look at all the stops, and kept it up until the romantic tragi-comedy that sees Peter van Wijk’s original screenplay last moment, pulling out the best a Dutch farmer leave behind and to apply amendments. from his co-stars too; a fantastic his flooded homeland for experience for everyone involved.” the warmth of southern Italy. “The story is about a romantic Nick Cunningham reports. Dutch farmer who cycles to Southern Italy and grows into a “Giancarlo Giannini Gauke is a farmer who loves his mythic, living legend,” Van Diem is the spider in the tulips, but after the biblical flood of underlines. “I’ve interpreted that center of the web” 1953 that claimed hundreds of lives, myth in a more exaggerated and he reckons that enough is enough fairytale way than was originally and sets forth on a bicycle across intended, and also made his love Dutch actor Gijs Naber puts in a Europe to the warmer climate of life a little more complicated. But muscular, bravura performance as Puglia, carrying nothing other than my most important contribution farmer Gauke and debutante Anneke a pocketful of tulip bulbs. was probably how the various Sluiters is mesmerizing as Ria, whom storytellers of this colourful history the Puglian residents assume to be Before he sets off, however, he each have their own version of the a latter-day Madonna. The role of the meets the mute yet alluring Ria. truth, and how they cross each other older Anna is played by Ksenia Solo Their brief union produces a child, in humorous ways. The role of (Black Swan, Lost Girl). “Gijs was Anna. Ria joins Gauke nine months Giancarlo Giannini – the policeman very good. And then there’s Anneke, later and, together, they create a who must discover the truth behind who plays his wife in her debut, an swathe of beautiful and colourful it all – was very small in the original amazing arrival on the big screen. “the various storytellers tulip fields. But a local Mafioso has story. Now, he is the spider in the She’s sure to make an impression.” of this colourful history his eye on Gauke’s profits, and after center of the web, and his scenes each have their own a very public altercation, Gauke form the ‘red thread’ in the film.” Tulipani is an expansive co-­pro­duc­ version of the truth” disappears… Thirty years later, an tion that bridges The Netherlands Italian police inspector (played by Van Diem sensed an initial reticence (Film Fund and Production leading actor Giancarlo Giannini) on Giannini’s part to engage fully Incentive support), Italy and Canada. attempts to unravel the mystery of within the production, but the It invokes the luscious and Director: Mike van Diem Script: Peter van Wijk Production: FATT Productions (NL) Co-Production: Don Carmody Productions (CA), Draka Productions (IT), Stemo Production (IT) Sales: Atlas Film 18 19 Catching tulip fever Continued from page 19 romantic cinema of Giuseppe scenes, I used big gestures to Tornatore (Cinema Paradiso) and indicate which sounds and volumes Michael Radford (Il Postino) and I wanted to hear, more like a displays a flair for violent pastiche conductor than a director, actually. worthy of Tarantino. Gauke himself That worked pretty well. Also, a Dutch actor Gijs Naber is reminiscent of the idealistic couple of the Italian actors spoke puts in a muscular, Gérard Depardieu in Claude Berri’s decent English. Then, if it was still bravura performance Jean de Florette. too complicated, we were lucky enough to be able to send in The scenes of countless rows of Annemarie van de Mond, the tulips in the fields outside Puglia directing assistant who had also are breathtaking and involved the worked on the first shoot, and was transport and planting of 14,000 fluent in Italian.” flowers. “All those beautiful, colourful tulips in the midst of the Despite winning the Academy grey-green of the olive trees and the Award for his debut feature, Mike Italian landscape. The magic van Diem is not the most prolific of worked,” comments production feature film directors. It took him designer Harry Ammerlaan. sixteen years to make a second film after his much-lauded Character. The romcom thriller The Surprise “Directing a film is (2015) starred Jan Decleir and won a little like being two Golden Calves, the top prizes in the father of a very Dutch cinema. What is just as large family” surprising is Van Diem’s delivery of Tulipani a mere two years later.

What’s more, the film is shot in “That’s right, I really enjoyed three languages, Dutch, English and working on The Surprise,” he Italian. Did Van Diem encounter stresses. “When you’re directing a any problems directing Italian cast film, it’s a little like being the father and crew? of a very large family, and I realized that, in the intervening years, “My Italian is absolutely terrible,” I’d especially missed that congenial, the director admits. “I can say to an social aspect of filmmaking. Right Italian actor: ‘A little to the left, or to after The Surprise, I was ready for the right’, or ‘With a little more another film.” emotion...’ But that’s my limit. Even so, communication was good. “Then when I was called about I don’t normally find what an actor directing Tulipani, I thought this says as important as how he says it. will be an awful job, working in Of course, Italian sounds beautiful, Southern Italy,” the director jokes. and I had a beautiful collection of “But also a chance for a unique voices, so during all the great fight adventure.”

20 21 Profile Hoyte van Hoytema, DOP High flying Dutchman

Right now, Hoyte van Hoytema wanted to film on the English humanity. It involved time travel. “Working with all these is probably The Netherlands’ Channel itself. However, he quickly The plot may have sounded incredible directors greatest film export, and the realised that shooting on the open fantastical but it was rooted in I learned that being a go-to DOP for many of the sea would be very unpredictable and advanced astrophysics. The physics DOP is a very specific world’s leading filmmakers. would force him to rely heavily on of kinetics, as well as light and time Geoffrey Macnab talks to him CGI (“which we didn’t want at all,” are all intertwined into the visual and complex profession about his work on Christopher Van Hoytema underlines). storytelling. “Trying to understand in its own right” Nolan’s Dunkirk. the science was a big motor behind It was at this point that the DOP’s the way we would light and shoot The Dunkirk evacuation in the summers spent growing up in The what we were trying to suggest.” summer of 1940 wasn’t just a Netherlands became so useful. He vaguely remembered episode for used to go sailing on the IJsselmeer, Dunkirk was equally gruelling but in Dutch cinematographer Hoyte van the huge fresh water lake, and a very different way. Nolan took a Hoytema. Like other events in the suggested this could be a place for hyper-real approach to recreating Second World War, it had a very the movie to shoot. “Visually it had episodes from early in WW2. Almost personal resonance for him. the right feel, and the limited depth every technical idea was original would enable us to anchor set pieces and custom-made for the film. “My grandfather was a Polish Jew who to the sea bottom… generally it was “We had to invent and built a lot of came to The Netherlands during a much more workable location, but hardware. Things like rigs to enable The Second World War. He was a still looking like the real thing.” heavy IMAX cameras to be mounted lieutenant in the war; fought in on Spitfires and mounts to film war­ Italy, England; participated in D-Day, The partnership with Nolan began planes engaging in dogfights from France, Belgium and The Nether­ after Nolan’s then regular DOP the other planes,” Van Hoytema lands. He was given the Leopold Wally Pfister went off to direct his explains. “We developed lenses that Order (highest military order in own movies. “Things just clicked,” could look around corners.” Belgium) for his heroism during the he remembers. “We had similar war, yet he lost almost all of his ideas about how to use the medium, The filmmakers were able to use the family left in Poland by execution or how to relate to the visual story­ huge IMAX camera with the same in the concentration camps. So yes, telling. Also we had a shared love flexibility and invention as if it was a the Second World War has always for film and for wanting to do things tiny Go Pro camera hidden away been an overlaying theme in our in camera as opposed to using CGI. inside the tiny cockpit of a fighter family and deeply shaped the way We started working together and plane. They built houses in order to we look into this world.” things just came naturally and be able to dip the cameras under­ effortlessly, which is a good thing water while protecting them from Now, Van Hoytema is receiving in the stressful and complex the salt and the sand. They also hugely enthusiastic reviews for his environment of making a film.” built stabilising cranes so they work on Christopher Nolan’s new could shoot ‘boat to boat’. epic, Dunkirk. The cinemato­grapher To prepare for Interstellar, the first is responsible for a large part of the movie he did with Nolan, Van “It goes on and on,” Van Hoytema movie coming to shoot in The Hoytema took a crash course in says of the way they dealt with Netherlands. Right from the outset, science. This was a story which so many daunting technical Nolan had been determined to involved astronauts travelling challenges. “Preparing this film was Hoyte van Hoytema (left) with director Christopher Nolan shoot ‘in real water, with real set through a wormhole in space as so much about coming up with pieces and real waves’. At first, he they tried to locate a new home for mechanical or optical solutions to

22 23 High flying Dutchman Continued from page 23 be able to do things with the IMAX in world cinema. He has done extra­ camera that we hadn’t seen before; ordinary work on films ranging to present the viewer with the most from Nolan’s Interstellar to Spike visceral way of being there that we Jonze’s Her, David O. Russell’s could think of.” The Fighter, Sam Mendes’ Spectre and Tomas Alfredson’s Let The For all his international success, Right One In. He’s shot Bond Van Hoytema still takes his Dutch movies (Spectre), sports biopics roots very seriously. He may now live (The Fighter), sci-fi driven epics and work in LA but he grew up in (Interstellar) and, with Dunkirk, The Netherlands and spent all his a war picture to end all war pictures. time there until he went off to His approach, though, is always the Poland to study when he was 21. same. He doesn’t look at budget or His relatives are all still in Holland genre when choosing new projects. and he speaks affectionately of the His main concern is always with the cult comedy series, Jiskefet. As he vision behind them. “I choose my says, “it’s hard not to feel Dutch.” projects by director,” he declares. His career has taken him away from “No other way. In that perspective The Netherlands. He had wanted to I will not dismiss any genre or kind be a filmmaker as long as he could of film, but it all depends on what remember and tried twice to get director is attached, and which way into the Dutch Film Academy but that director wants to go.” was rejected on each occasion. He therefore headed to the celebrated And, no, he doesn’t have any desire Film School in Lodz, Poland. to turn director himself. “Working with all these incredible directors “In retrospect I am so lucky that I learned that being a DOP is a very I ended up there,” he says.” It was specific and complex profession in very unpractical, very philosophical its own right, and can take a lifetime and very artful. Not the kind of school to master,” he reflects. that prepares you for finding a place in a harsh professional TV and film “What it entails is forever evolving environment, but it shapes you as a and there are always ways to get visual artist. You come out of there better at it. I am not finished and with a lot of artistic confidence and bored by it. Directing is a different a boosted level of vanity… and if you beast, and I think I would suck at it. have the patience and the means to Watching Chris multitask, or Sam deal with the harsh reality of being Mendes direct actors or Spike Jonze unemployed for very long after, you inspire the masses is very humbling. will eventually become a full blown I would never be able to come even DOP.” close to what they have to offer as directors, but maybe, with a lot of Now, Van Hoytema is one of the hard work I might become a half most celebrated cinematographers good DOP one day.” Bros Ent All Rights Reserved © 2017 Warner Dunkirk Christopher Nolan

24 25 Production report Dunkirk Epic benefits

Maarten Swart of Kaap Holland to help the production. Some were glimpse of boy band star Harry The Americans were Film has worked on his fair employed as extras, and the local Styles, who has a role in the film. very happy with the share of kids’ movies, action mayor gave the project his blessing. “There were a lot of girls in work of their Dutch films and come­dies. What he campers,” Swart recalls. Some came partners had never done before was For Swart, working on a Hollywood from as far afield as Germany. oversee a US studio epic. movie was a revealing and exhilarat­ However, the production base was Geoffrey Macnab reports. ing experience. This was the well guarded and they were never ‘biggest production ever on Dutch able to get too close to Styles. When Warner Bros decided to bring soil’, a far more expensive and Christopher Nolan’s wartime epic ambitious under­taking even than The Americans were very happy with Dunkirk to shoot for four or five Paul Verhoeven’s wartime film the work of their Dutch partners. weeks on the Holland’s vast fresh­ Black Book. Swart points to the Swart and his colleagues weren’t water lake, the IJsselmeer, executive sheer scope of the film. The Dutch just helping with the day-to-day producer Jake Myers immediately producer also marvelled at director/ shooting. They had to file all the contacted line producer Erwin producer Nolan’s control of every documents to qualify the film for Godschalk of Dutch production part of the filmmaking process and the rebate and arrange permits outfit Kaap Holland Film, and the at his attention to detail. Whether it on all levels. “It was a hefty and company’s MD Maarten Swart. was using a remotely controlled lengthy process,” Swart states. What the Dunkirk execs didn’t airplane or preparing the set for the realise was that Warner Bros already use of the bulky IMAX cameras, International audiences watching owned the company. no detail was ignored. “All those Dunkirk may not realise that a large little things, they make a huge part of the location work was done “They only found out afterwards!” difference.” This may have been a in The Netherlands. Nonetheless, Swart remembers. The execs were film with a budget of $100+ million Swart insists that the Dutch are also pleasantly surprised to discover but there was very little wastage or ‘getting noticed’ internationally and that they qualified for a €1 million inefficiency. The producers kept a that Nolan’s film can only help cash rebate via the Production very tight rein on all the costs. encourage other projects to come Incentive. The ongoing support of to The Netherlands. the Netherlands Film Commission The Dutch producer was startled proved to be an added sweetener. by the painstaking attention the As for his own work, Swart has Dunkirk execs paid to marketing, plenty of other projects. He co-­pro­ Dunkirk set up its production offices even from the very earliest stages. duced Michaël R. Roskam’s new in the small fishing village of Urk, They kept news about the film very gangster film Racer And the Jailbird, where the Protestant inhabitants close to their chest but knew just premiering at the autumn festivals, are known for being ultra-religious. when to release information to the and he has enjoyed a cult hit with “They had some concerns about media to create the maximum comedy Ron Goossens, Low Budget shooting on Sundays. We immediately impact. “Everything is controlled, Stuntman. The future slate includes said that we would work out together from the very first to the very last arthouse features like A Shining a shooting schedule not including sentence. It might be a little too far Flaw, a film from renowned photo­ Sunday,” Swart recalls of the locals’ for Dutch standards, but it clearly grapher Erwin Olaf, and a new response. The villagers were worked very well!” feature from Alejandro Agresti. ‘absolutely thrilled’ to have Nolan But, no, it is hardly a surprise that shooting the movie in their back­ Yes, the teenage girls came in their none will have quite the ‘scope or

© 2017 Warner Bros Ent All Rights Reserved © 2017 Warner yard and did everything they could numbers to Urk, hoping to catch a scale of Dunkirk.’ Dunkirk Christopher Nolan

26 27 Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen We Margiela Menna Laura Meijer, for mint First among equals

We Margiela, screening at the anything other than the company’s Paris or Tokyo. The Margiela models world famous Museum Boijmans designs, and turned himself into a may have been beautiful but their Margiela’s fashion van Beuningen, Oct 22, tells the recluse. The only published picture faces were often covered, so as not output was mad, story of radical Belgian fashion of him is a snapshot taken through to distract from the clothes. For the dazzling and house, Maison Martin Margiela. a car window. Even the celebrated Boijmans exhibition of Maison unimaginably inventive Nick Cunningham reports. Annie Liebowitz had to shoot an Margiela the garments were hung empty chair for the company outside the museum’s windows, According to one character in mint portrait. When a staff member one facing inwards like couture wraiths. film office’s We Margiela, the story day observed a stranger hoovering What’s more, the Margiela clothes of the eponymous maison de couture the office floor, it was only later he labels were the last word in minimalist, is one that has never been told discovered that the mystery cleaner blank and attached by four simple before. This film is bound to assume was in fact his esteemed boss. stiches, each piece of needlepoint a defining status, he therefore visible through the material. acknowledges. Equally, Meirens (who died in July 2017) was not one given to self- Like their mint film office counter­ One senses that he is not wrong. promotion and her contribution to parts, many staff members at We Margiela is, in equal measure, We Margiela is purely verbal, her Margiela shared the concept of the serious, playful, artistic and voice always accompanied by a blank collective ‘we’, at least when the intelligent, and is shot through with screen. “White is a screen on which company was young and idealistic an avant-garde aesthetic. What’s people project themselves a lot,” she and the world seemed blissful. more, it is testament to Rotterdam- tells the filmmakers at the beginning. It is left to the company’s highly based doc house mint film office, articulate, and somewhat cynical, whose staff speak as a collective as Between 1989 and 2002 (when the head of press to put us straight: they acknowledge how the process company went public – the event “the ‘we’,” he says, “existed on one of creation is a selfless and which heralded Meirens’ departure) floor of a house that had a creative collaborative one. “Our main Margiela’s fashion output was mad, director on the top floor”. (Likewise, interest [in making this film] was the dazzling and unimaginably inventive. the mint film office manifesto urges whole notion of a shared creative Leather boots had sewn-in partitions caution for the naive: “Though we process and group dynamics within for toes, humble duvets were trans­ understand the longing to work in a creative communities,” the company formed into couture coats and cotton group, we are wary about how much manifesto states. The film’s director socks were spliced, joined and turned this is a romantic notion, an economic Menna Laura Meijer (Kyteman, Now into delicately cut blouses. “If there solution and whether a creative What; 69, Love, Sex, Senior) was is one who is a master in turning process can be democratic at all.”) merely first among equals. something cheap into something classy, it is Martin,” stresses Meirens. The film ends in crackly silence, The Margiela label was founded by echoing Meirens’ departure from Martin and the highly entrepreneurial For Margiela, street corners became the business premises on her last Jenny Meirens in 1989. He controlled catwalks, as did the roughest of day as owner. So the last word on the the output, she was the business schools (replete with curious and Margiela legacy must go to Lise, the brains. He was brilliant and maverick, chaotic kids). Sometimes the press company’s head of artisan design, but also kind and inspirational. She were sidelined, as when fashion who helped develop the company’s was savvy, innovative and intuitive. launches were held in retail situ within­ concept of flea market chic. “Martin But they both valued their privacy. the fashion emporia of London’s had the finger of God,” she says. He detested the press writing about Fulham Road or the high streets of “For him it was easy. He knew.” Director & script: Menna Laura Meijer Production: mint film office As of October 2017 in Boijmans van Beuningen, Rotterdam

28 29 In Blue Jaap van Heusden Under her wing

Her sympathy for him is obvious but At first, Van Heusden felt that she is always able to fly back west actress Maria Kraakman would be whenever matters become too too intense to play the flight uncomfortable. “The other player in attendant. She is very well-known this relation­ship doesn’t have this and has worked with some of The freedom or privilege. He is just Netherlands’ leading art house stuck and needs to wait until she directors, Nanouk Leopold and Alex pops up,” the director says of the van Warmerdam among them. Jaap van Heusden boy. Nevertheless there is an ambi­ To Van Heusden’s delight this guous sexual tension between the ‘powerhouse, emotional’ actress Geoffrey Macnab talks to Jaap two characters, the reason for which turned out to be both funny and van Heusden, whose In Blue is suggested before the film’s end. social, and had a ‘lightness’ that he opens the Films By The Sea. observed in many flight attendants. Van Heusden admits to a fascination In Blue is the story of a flight with flight attendants. “If you go by Bogdan Iancu, the teenager who plays attendant – Lin, immensely capable train, the air hostesses from KLM are the boy, was found in Bucharest. and calm under pressure – who already wearing their uniforms going “The quality of the actors who came strikes up an unlikely friendship to work. On all the trains going to in was just shockingly good, really, with an impoverished but street­ the airport, you see these very neatly really good,” the director says of the smart teenage street kid she meets in dressed flight attendants in their Romanian casting calls. Bogdan, an bizarre circumstances in Bucharest blue uniforms. It is very attractive as experienced child actor, wasn’t after her taxi knocks him over. Jaap a kind of theatre performance.” from as tough a background as the van Heusden co-wrote the screenplay boy he was playing. “For him to read with Jan Willem den Bok. Both During the research, the director the script was absolutely shocking,” racked up thousands of air miles in and screenwriter met lots of flight the director recalls. He didn’t the process, the director points out. attendants. They were very realise that there were streets kids impressed their tact, empathy and living in such poverty just yards Den Bok came up with the idea of powers of communication. away from where he went to school making the lead character a flight “They are very sensitive to all the every day. “It was a world which even attendant. He had been making unsaid things. They find it very easy to him was very new.” docs for TV that had required him to make contact. They’re not afraid (as van Heusden puts it) to “fly from of people at all. If there is an One of the film’s key themes is the one poor country to the next, obnoxious man who is twice their ever widening gap that exists making these reports and spending weight, they have to be able to between citizens in the privileged a lot of time with these young boys control him – in the air. They have west and those living in far more who survived on the street, first in nothing other than their social oppressive circumstances in the This powerhouse, Brazil and then in Ukraine.” skills with which to do it.” east. The early plan had been to emotional actress had shoot in Kiev but the filmmakers a lightness that Van In the film (Film Fund selective Van Heusden had a vision of a type decided to move the production to Heusden observed in funding/Production Incentive of woman who was confident, out­ Romania. Why? “No-one wanted too support) Lin becomes involved in going, but not so intellectual. In the insure it,” the director says of the many flight attendants the life of the kid. She feels guilty film, though, Lin is confronted with civil war brewing in Ukraine. “Also, about his injuries and takes on an a situation that she can’t just sweep we realised the very violent situation

Photo: IJswater - Films almost maternal role in his life. away and forget once a flight is over. would get in the way of the story.” Director: Jaap van Heusden Script: Jan- Willem den Bok, Jaap van Heusden Production: IJswater Films (NL) Co-Production: Caviar (BE), NTR (NL), Strada Films (RO) 30 31 San Sebastian Film Festival Boarding cargo Cargo Gilles Coulier

When the Belgian duo eventually really funny to see how they worked. pitched their tale of a seafaring I was fascinated to see how other patriarch and his three feuding producers and crew work on set.” sons, all set on a fishing boat on the North Sea, Kerbosch was hooked. The Dutch technical contribution

Photo: Bas Boagerts “I was intrigued by the specific to the film, which received €200k cultural world of Ostend that they minority support from the Nether­ presented, and then after Berlin they lands Film Fund, included sound Gilles Coulier sent me the script and I really loved design by Vincent Sinceretti, who it. I am a slow reader but this time also worked on Sam de Jong’s For Dutch production house I learned that if it doesn’t take so Prince. Part of the film was edited Halal, the co-production of much time to read – if the story just Cargo was both a pleasure and grabs you – then it is a good sign it is an eye-opening experience. the right script. But I think we had “If it doesn’t take so Now the film world-premieres in already decided that first evening.” much time to read, it is a San Sebastian. Company chief sign it is the right script” Gijs Kerbosch talks to Nick In Cargo, after tragedy besets the Cunningham. elderly Leon on the high seas, a series of dramatic aftershocks turns in The Netherlands and make-up The way Gijs Kerbosch tells it, it all the world of his three sons upside was applied by a team headed by sounds so easy. At the end of a long down, and they find themselves on the Dutch Eva Lotte Oosterop. day pitching co-pro at Berlin 2015 the road to criminality, marital This entailed the daily drawing of he met up with his mate Sam de strife and financial ruin. complex tattoos on the bodies of Jong in the bar. Sam’s feature the sea-faring men. Prince, produced by Kerbosch, had For the co-pro partners the cross- been very well received and he was border accord didn’t end at the Despite its burgeoning reputation, sharing a drink with a Belgian Berlinale. Kerbosch went onto the Halal hasn’t been particularly active director, Gilles Coulier, who was set in Belgium where he was deeply in terms of territory-by-territory also in Berlin on pitch duty. impressed by Coulier’s modus subsidized co-production. (In the Kerbosch takes up the tale. operandi. “What I found really past the company has invested its interesting was how he was so into own money or, in the case of Prince, “Gilles was very clever and very directing some of Flanders’ most collaborated with the digital media smart and we talked a lot about revered actors in such a great and powerhouse VICE Media). But, says films and personal stuff… detailed way.” Kerbosch, that is all set to change. sometimes you have a natural click “We are working on a couple of with someone on a friendship “And the production was super films at the moment. One is set in level,” he remembers. So as not to relaxed too,” the Halal founder Iceland – I think it is a good idea to break the spell, what the pair continues. “Everybody was making co-produce with a Scandinavian pointedly refused to do was talk jokes, but the moment the First AD country. And I also hope that we will about Coulier’s debut feature said we had to prepare for the next co-produce with De Wereldvrede project Cargo. That would come shot, then we had to be super again in Belgium. Is co-production later that evening when producers focused. But whenever there was the my preferred way of financing? Gilles de Schryver and Wouter Sap opportunity again to make a joke, Definitely, as it was such a great of De Wereldvrede would join them. there was another joke. It was experience on Cargo.“ Director: Gilles Coulier Script: Gilles Coulier, Tom Dupont Production: De Wereldvrede (BE) Co-Production: Halal (NL), Chevaldeuxtrois (BE/FR) Sales: Wide

32 33 Film Festival Locarno Lighting up Locarno Selections from The Netherlands

The Locarno International Film in Locarno (Filmmakers of the French, Jewish and Armenian Festival underlined once more Present) to great acclaim winning background reside,” Buga this year its keen interest in the Swatch Art Peace Hotel Award. comments. “I find the film films from The Netherlands with Programmer Lorenzo Esposito particularly important since the selection of three feature declared it to be, “the most powerful thematically it brings to the (co)productions and a Dutch debut in Turkish cinema in recent screen the experience of being an short. Nick Cunningham reports. years. Keltek films with a rare elderly minority in the context metaphysical precision, brilliantly of contemporary Istanbul, and how When fledgling director Stefanie sliding the real event onto a plane of that experience differs from the Kolk presented her debut total filmic reinvention and leading majoritarian experience. (graduation) film Clan at Locarno the very concept of documentary to And on a formal level, the film 2016, she must have made quite an a point of no return.” In the film the bends the horizons of documentary impression. When, earlier this year, invasion by the Turkish army into filmmaking.” the festival’s programmers learned the country’s Kurdish region is about her second film Harbour, accompanied by a hail of meteorites Sanjeewa Pushpakumara’s Davena about two immigrant working as which lights up the night sky, Vihagun (Burning Birds), about a industrial painters on the Rotter­ sending the people pouring onto woman who goes to desperate dam waterfront, they programmed the streets. lengths to save her family, has been the film (based on the picture edit) selected for a raft of festivals since in the festival’s Pardi di Domani The film was executive produced by its world premiere at the Busan in international short film competition. Marc van Goethem and co-financed October 2016. The film received In the work, supported by The with director Keltek. “Gürcan has IFFR Hubert Bals Fund (HBF) Netherlands Film Fund, the two men been a close friend of mine for more support in 2015 and won the Special alone must decide what to do when than 10 years and we were always Jury Prize (the second prize) of 17th they see a body floating in the water. discussing forming an independent Tokyo FILMeX International Film company focusing on documentary Festival. “People from all over the world work and experimental film,” says Van at the enormous Rotterdam harbour Goethem. “I was involved in his Dutch-Afghani Dawood Hilmandi’s – one of the biggest ports in Europe – previous film Colony in 2015 which Badeszenen won top prize of €36,000 it’s like a country where everybody is screened at more than 40 festivals at the Open Doors co-pro forum. at home yet where nobody actually and won Best Newcomer Award at A magical realist tale, the film is pro­ lives,” Kolk stresses. “There are Dokufest.” duced by Mohamed Husain Naikzad many other people in the harbour at Bamiyan Film Production, with that are probably in a much better Also in Filmmakers of the Present offices in Afghanistan and Amster­ position to deal with this problem was Shevaun Mizrahi’s Distant dam. It follows Yoro, a motherless [of the dead body] than they are. Costellation, co-produced by Shelly 12-year-old who serves his father’s Of course, we see this irony at play Grizim and the Dutch Deniz Buga. two new wives. “In my works, I want on a large scale, too. Countries that All three were classmates on the to share moments from a world of have the most problems of their own NYU Graduate Film Programme. deep sorrow and deep happiness, “The most powerful always seem to be the ones that have At the Locarno closing ceremony and nothing in-between,” said debut in Turkish to take responsibility,” she adds. the film received a Special Mention. Hilmandi. “Locarno truly opened cinema in recent years” “Distant Costellation takes place in a the ‘door’ to a world full of beautiful Gürcan Keltek’s feature documentary retirement home in Istanbul where possibilities in which I can start to Meteors (Meteorlar) world-premiered mostly old Istanbulites with Greek, share my cinematic world.” Meteors Director & script: Gürcan Keltek Production: 29P Films (NL) Sales: Heretic Outreach

34 35 Cinekid Festival director Floor van Spaendonck New kid on the block

Van Spaendonck is used to Maastricht as well as within innovating. From 2008-2012, she Amsterdam itself. The kids won’t was the director of the Virtueel just be watching films passively but Platform, the Amsterdam-based will be ‘makers’ too, participating in e-culture knowledge institute. every part of the festival. Here, she was dealing with artists, filmmakers, theatre practitioners, Another change is that Van Spaen­ architects, fashion designers and donck and her team are seeing more Floor van Spaendonck young turks from the gaming world, films than ever. They’ve watched trying to bring them together and over 700 titles this year, up from It’s one of the longest running encouraging them to embrace the around 400 that their predecessors and prestigious international brave new digital world. The idea used to watch and choose from. festivals for kids. Now, it has a was to encourage artists not to “The balance comes almost naturally,” new head, Floor van Spaendonck. ‘consider new digital technology as she says of the Dutch-facing side of Geoffrey Macnab reports. a threat but to embrace it as an the festival and its international opportunity’. During this period, she dimension. The Dutch family film Floor van Spaendonck took over as was a regular attendee at Cinekid’s competition is one of the mainstays the new director of the Cinekid much vaunted Medialab, where the of the festival programme. It provides Foundation in February and will be key ingredients are art, film and new international visitors with the chance at the helm of Cinekid for this year’s technology, and lots of kids to see local fare. At the same time, edition (October 14-27). She may enjoying themselves while learning. the Best Children’s Film Comp have replaced the formidable allows Dutch audiences to see kids’ Sannette Naeyé, who ran the event “As a visitor, I had a great love for movies they would almost certainly for two decades, but she doesn’t Cinekid and a great admiration for otherwise have missed. seem abashed in the slightest by the the work that Sanette has done,” the challenges that lie ahead. new director says. Aside from the rich One change that Sannette Naeyé selection of new children’s movies achieved before she left Cinekid was So, how does she follow Sanette? she points to the programmes for to re-locate the event within the One answer is that Van Spaendonck, professionals and the excellent Ministry of Culture. This means that formerly Head of Policy and Inter­ industry seminars staged at the it gets its state funding directly from national Affairs at Het Nieuwe festival, attended by both filmmakers government (rather than via The Instituut in Rotterdam, has and academics. She is delighted Netherlands Film Fund) and that it restructured the curatorial team. now to have the opportunity to help has the same status as the other She talks of ‘conducting a balanced the event ‘take the next step’. major Dutch festivals, IFFR, IDFA “Art, film and new program with the determined voice and The Netherlands Film Festival. technology, and lots of from the heads of film, TV and new Under Van Spaendonck, Cinekid kids enjoying them­ media, rather than taking one of the will spread its wings yet further. The festival expects to attract selves while learning” programmers seats herself’. She The festival won’t be confined to around 60,000 young visitors, a very also wants to bring more coherence Amster­dam. Starting with the healthy number. Van Spaendonck, to a festival which had grown and national opening in Nijmegen, this who is on a multiple year contract, grown in size since it was launched year’s Cinekid On Tour will have a has been in the job for just over 6 in 1986. She refers to the ‘island truly national footprint. There will months. That’s not long but what is structure’ that some delegates have be screenings all across the country, clear is that she is already putting encountered when visiting Cinekid. everywhere from Rotterdam to her stamp on the event.

36 37 EYE Exhibition: 16 Sept – 3 Dec 2017 Kindred spirits Locus: Apichatpong Weerasethakul – Cao Guimarães

which is in a way expressed in our screenings of all my nine feature work. Also we both work at the films in the museum’s film theatre borders of the cinema world and the during the whole exhibition art world.” period.”

Weerasethakul responds in kind. Most of Weerasethakul’s films, “I don’t know what Cao will exhibit photographs, experimental videos but I am a great admirer of his work. and film installations are set in the I first saw his work about a man who north-east of Thailand, where he lives alone in a cave for a film grew up. Weerasethakul is Apichatpong program that I co-curated. I have an interested in the history, memory Weerasethakul Cao Guimarães affinity with anything cave-related.” and sensory experience of this The film was The Soul of the Bone region. In his world there is no This Autumn sees an exhibition (2004), which will be included distinction between present and at EYE of the sensory and within the exhibition. past, between visible reality and dreamlike works of two dreamed truth. Many of his works prominent international film The exhibition space at EYE is feature ‘spirits’ – ancestors, wood artists, Apichatpong beautiful, angular and challenging, nymphs, figures from ancient Weerasethakul from Thailand and perfectly suited to the work of legends or mythical stories. and the Brazilian Cao these filmmakers who offer a The seemingly casual way they form Guimarães. parallax view of the quotidian world. part of his filmed reality shows that, for Weerasethakul, they are not Guimarães and Weerasethakul are The work of Cao Guimarães is strangers but simply part of life. kindred artistic spirits who take the situated at the interface between The Thai master won a Palme d’Or in mundane reality around them as cinema and art. Self-taught, he pays Cannes in 2010 for Uncle Boonmee the starting point for their work, but little heed to prevailing conventions Who Can Recall His Past Lives. it requires their exceptional taste and and predictable forms of film­ highly attuned sense of aesthetic to making. Although documentary by Both filmmakers have enjoyed close reveal its beauty, colours, rhythms, nature, his images float between relationships with the Dutch film light, sounds and smells. familiar reality and a world in industry. While Guimarães was which the senses enjoy free reign selected three times for IFFR and The decision to couple both artists and – just as in the work of once for IDFA, Weerasethakul’s within the same EYE exhibition Weerasethakul – break free from international career started at meets very much with the approval rational considerations. In that way, Rotterdam after the selection of of each. “I think there are some Guimarães’ images evoke a world Mysterious Object at Noon in 2000. similar elements in our way of that blends dream, sensual looking at the world, especially experience and reality. “I am blessed to have had support trying to extract poetry from the from the Hubert Bals Fund over the ordinary things,” comments “I will show eight or nine videos years,” Weerasethakul stresses. Guimarães. “We are both from installed in the exhibition space. “In fact the HBF has become quite a countries with a powerful popular They are from different periods of model in our region when discussing culture, where people have a kind my career and will be shown as a Cinema, cultural support and of special relationship with their projection and also in monitors,” investment. I am very glad to have

bodies, let’s say a natural sensuality, Guimarães confirms. “There will be had such a long relationship.” Courtesy the artist and Kick Machine Films, Bangkok Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives Apichatpong Weerasethakul

38 39 Rifka Lodeizen

Rifka is one of The Netherlands’ most in 2009 for her brilliant portrayal of Marleen Jonkman’s Messi and Maud. versatile and enigmatic actors, and Marieke in Esther Rots’ Can Go Declares Rifka: “The characters I play the owner of a face upon which every Through Skin. are in heavy situations. What if you nuanced cinematic moment can be In 2016 she played the lead in Paula van know you are dying? What if your child read. der Oest’s Tonio, the Dutch submission dies. What if you can’t get children. After her Best Actress Golden Calf for the Academy Awards. In 2017 she I try to shift into the characters and nomination for Eddy Terstall’s Simon stars in two Toronto selections, their situation but also to give space for in 2004, she picked up the award itself Disappearance by Boudewijn Koole and my own impulses and emotions.”