Discoveries from Netherlands World Cinema

A live-action animation comprised of brief images (single-frame shots) and dual images about a naked man in a black space. We become extremely aware of his physicality, while the film also carries out an attack on our physical abilities.

Marion Bloem attempts to connect with the origins of her Indo-European family through conversations about the colonial era, the Indonesian struggle for independence, and the adaptation to the cold Netherlands.

The Russian model city Ж has been completely shielded from change and reality. A poetic film-essay, The Radiant Screen explores this Soviet utopia which is cloaked behind a smokescreen of plutonium waste. Since the fall of the Soviet Union, it has consciously – and unconsciously – remained closed.

A coot and a ferry skipper peacefully coexist along a city river. Their harmony is disrupted when a new bridge emerges, causing the skipper to lose all his passengers overnight. Fortunately, the bird, typically engrossed in nest-building, unexpectedly becomes the link that revitalizes the ferry’s purpose. Marlies encapsulated the essence of community unity within a vibrant two-minute animation.

The true story of 11-year-old Mary Bell who killed two small boys in England in 1968. Re-enacted by members of Barbie's extended family, this video describes a mother-daughter relation gone crazy.

“Questbound- Forbidden Ventures of the Undead – From Death to Life to Death Again”, is an animated short film about a depressed skeleton king who hasn’t felt anything in the last ten thousand years, and has given up hope on ever doing so again. Until a flamboyant noble knight enters his lair to slay him.

Experimental documentary by Johan van der Keuken about Dutch painter and poet Lucebert.

See and hear synthetic actors talk about ‘AI-acting’, addressing many artists’ fears, namely losing artistic exclusivity because of emerging AI technology. Synthetic actors - generated with DALL•E 2, explain the differences between ‘traditional’ 3D-animated characters and them, ai-generated actors, as well as how artificial intelligence will affect acting careers in general soon.

A moving and hilariously honest portrait of a transgender son and his mom based on the successful eponymous play. We see a kid who’s becoming more and more clear and a confused mom who can barely keep up with him. Creating space for addressing the wrongs, concerns and clichés, this film provides a loving insight into the reality of a kid in transition. It shows the impact that ‘becoming who you are’ has on a family, but at the same time addresses universal themes like growing up, becoming an adult and the art of raising a kid and letting them go.

Short experimental film about a man and a woman in an apartment in a commuter town. Their relationship is sketched out in three scenes. The passion has disappeared and there is almost no communication left.

Television registration of the latest theatre program by the Dutch comedian Micha Wertheim. A performance about what fantasy is capable of.

Imprenta is a short dance film written and directed by Junadry Leocaria. Together with visual artist Richard Kofi and musician Ernest Guiraud Cissé she explores the journeys of her ancestors, reaches out for spiritual connection using movement, music, poetry, and symbolism. Finding nothing less then a home within for all of them. Cinematography by Conni Trommlitz, made with the support of Korzo Dance Theatre, The Hague.

People who create explore, and get to know themselves and others better. In this cinematographic essay, Rolf Orthel looks for the meaning of creating, with reality or the memory of it as a starting point and a train journey as a meandering ribbon through the film. We see the first musical steps of primary school children and youngsters at Jeugdtheaterschool Zuid-Oost. We see what talent does to you when a conservatory student practices for his graduation, when someone paints a remarkable self-portrait or when Konvooi creates a thrilling play. This is high-level creation which makes you wonder how on earth it is possible that you can suddenly be enchanted and moved. The conclusion of Orthel’s search? Creating things is the best.

Short documentary on an anual Belgian cycling race.

In the Bijlmer, in Amsterdam-Zuidoost, every culture has its own rituals around death. Funeral manager Anita has the task of attracting all those cultures to her soon to be built multicultural funeral home in the middle of the Bijlmer. Anita sets out on a tour to get to know this unfamiliar world. But the deeper she penetrates, the more she realises how little she knows about the Bijlmer’s different cultures.

Ten years, three theater shows, and a best-of show later. A decade has flown by, and his thirtieth birthday is slowly creeping closer. But has Xander De Rycke learned anything over the past few years? Has he actually grown up, or does he just think he has? Flanders' best observational comedian is back and ready for the next step. With a head full of twists and turns, a bunch of colorful references, and an eye on the future, Xander De Rycke is back with "Quarter-Life Crisis." A show with relatable moments about life. Or at least a quarter of it.

A stop-motion spoof that targets the foibles of creatures of all kinds, this animation reverses the usual hierarchy of the animal kingdom with very memorable and hilarious results.

In the early 90s, a Dutch dance company, ‘t Concern, asked me to join its members in devising a show. They came to me as a filmmaker, because the aim was to come up with a dance-performance that would include moving images. The company consisted of five female dancers and one male dancer. This unusual combination led me to suggest basing the show on the archetypal 1950s housewife and her everyday chores. And setting this against the ballet music of Delibes, Čajkovskij and Glazunov. (I had an aunt who had never been a ballet dancer but who listened to ballet music as she went about doing her housework). The idea was to match each professional female dancer with a non-professional male dancer. The only surviving trace of this show remains its 16mm entr’actes, shown here under the title Echte clichés. Does not every cliché contain a grain of truth to be rediscovered?

So young he can barely carry his spear, a young boy lagging behind the other warriors is dragged into a bizarre world of shifting sands.

Esteban, a future Olympic swimmer, has grown up with a single mother and doesn't know who his father is. As he searches for his identity in this poetic short film, he determines swimming is a metaphor for life itself.

Stylised documentary portrait of the Amsterdam Levantkade area and the 'urban nomads' who in the late eighties sought refuge in this no-man's-land now cleared. The film tells the story of the Levantkade, a quay in Amsterdam's old doc area. In the twenties Levantkade was a gateway for Eastern European emigrants on their way to South America. In the eighties Levantkade became a haven for drop-outs, for foreigners and for homeless people who lived here on a different planet until the police came to clear the area for the wreckers. The film shows these 'urban indians' in documentary form, interspersed with archive material about immigrants, dating from 1926.

The death in prison of Sergei Magnitsky, a young Russian lawyer, remains one of the darkest scandals in the blotchy history of Russia's criminal justice system.

Dutch photographer Erwin Olaf (1959) is on the threshold of an important year: his most recent photographic series, Hope, Grief and Rain appear to have given him an international breakthrough. His work has been criticized since the 1980s as being produced merely for its shock value, thus eliminating it as art. But now that important art dealers and museums all over the world are showing his works, and huge crowds are visiting his expositions, it seems as if his years of hard work will finally lead to serious recognition. Yet this is occurring, of all times, in a period of his life in which Erwin Olaf is contending with emphysema, a debilitating disease that obliges him to deal cautiously with his energy reserves. Whether his body can keep up with his work pace is uncertain.

This Documentary provides an inside view into the life of up-tempo Poet, writer, drug-abuser and Jazz DJ Jules Deelder. The film takes us from jazz-festival to jazz-festival. There he plays his impressive and rare collections of records, mostly for himself and with some disregard for his audience. Jules Deelder provides us with an interesting view on jazz when it was at its popularity peak. This is inter-cut with interviews of his closest friends, colleagues, musicians and contemporary poets. The essence of Jules Deelder, a man of many words but one whom is hard to understand/grasp, is best captured in the dramatically styled 8mm black an white footage used in the film.

Inay (9) and her brother have a day off from school and they have to join their father who needs to go on a special trip. During this route, through the awakening city, Inay secretly tries to cause a delay. She knows that if they arrive late at their destination, she will be rewarded with loads of sweet desserts.

In the early spring of 1997, Theo van Gogh conducted a series of interviews with Willem Oltmans, the man who at the time loudly proclaimed that he had been obstructed by the State of the Netherlands for more than forty years—in particular Foreign Minister Luns, who called Willem Oltmans "the single-engine mosquito." For years, his lament was barely heard in the Netherlands. But around the mid-nineties, a different wind seemed to be blowing, and Oltmans gained an increasingly wider audience. For it turned out he was right; according to hundreds of secret coded telegrams, he had been obstructed for years in an extremely bizarre manner.

After waking up in a hotel room with no memory of the night before, a young woman pieces together what happened, only to realise that her boundaries were crossed while she was under the influence.

The Witteveen family did not often talk about the war, not even their grandmother, who had lived through it. That changes when one of her grandsons, through his aunt, comes across an old liberation skirt belonging to his grandmother, a garment she had kept for 73 years. Curious about the story behind it, he delves into archives and talks to family members in search of answers. What begins as a simple discovery becomes a personal journey through her war experiences and a reflection on his own freedom, identity, and how the traces of the past are still palpable.

From the Dutch coast, ten immigrants in the form of a boat walk through Amsterdam and back to the sea, like a metaphor for the journey of the explorer and those discovered. The narrow streets and the squares of Amsterdam stand for the present and the past.

A stand-up comedy set by the Dutch comedian Hans Sibbel, recorded live in Toomler in January 2008.

What was young gets old, what was healthy is sick. Uncertainty has crept in. What started out tough ends in melancholy. In that sense, this is a farewell.

Anne has to choose between two men, Rudmer and Murk. Rudmer seems to be a bad guy and ends up in prison. When Rudmer is sitting there, Murk, who has had his eye on Anne for a long time, tries to palm her. However, Anne does not want to know anything about him. Later it turns out that Murk stole the cattle, which Rudmer was accused of earlier. Rudmer is released and gets Anne, a happy ending.

A barbed love story in which a woman reads an intriguing advertisement in the newspaper: 'mn sks wmn to d fr'. Together they discover an all-encompassing love.

A video essay about the rehearsal process of the dance performance Mozart / Concert Arias, un moto di gioia, a choreography by Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker and Rosas, which premiered at the Festival d’Avignon in July 1992.

A simple touch can trigger a gamut of emotions that are stored in the skin. But what can you do if you are never touched and the desire for physical contact remains unfulfilled?

After seven years of confinement in a psychiatric hospital for being declared insane after murder, Kristen is released on supervised parole by her doctor. As part of her therapy, she is allowed to return to the house where she committed the murder. However, a stalker living in the neighborhood appears to have it in for Kristen...

Ancientry is an early film by Paul de Mol. He films a vase that is on the edge of a pond in a park. While filming, Mole makes frequent use of the ‘single frame shot’ – an extremely short shot that consists of only of one frame, which is the building block of film. Occasionally the bombardment of images makes way for a longer shot, which enhances the contrast and gives the viewer a moment of rest.

In the village, Ben and Jelle hand out flyers for a five-day trip to Egypt. Commissioner Migrain and Grandpa and Grandma Fonkel are also there. Grandpa Fonkel doesn't like the idea of traveling with Migrain at all, but eventually gives in. Mieke stays behind at the police station with Toby. She doesn't trust the trip and warns Migrain, but he doesn't want to hear it. What if Mieke is right... Time for Mega Mindy to investigate.