The best you can say for toil is that it can fill up enough of a life that you don't have to spend your days thinking about the things you'd rather not. So it goes in Dutch director Nanouk Leopold's It's All So Quiet, a penetrating slog that, perhaps cleverly, offers viewers the chance to participate in its protagonist's chief endeavor: finding a way to pass the time while waiting for a mean old man to die. To its credit — and perhaps to most viewers' slumping disinterest — this still, observant film stirs exactly the feelings it depicts. It's too bad porn has never achieved such verisimilitude.
The lead is Jeroen Willems, in his final film role, playing Helmer, a small-time farmer whose operation is poised awkwardly between business and hobby. As we watch him...
The lead is Jeroen Willems, in his final film role, playing Helmer, a small-time farmer whose operation is poised awkwardly between business and hobby. As we watch him...
- 1/7/2015
- Village Voice
Not much happens in "It's All So Quiet," a tender portrait of middle-aged frustrations set on a desolate farm, but nearly every moment is steeped in deep sadness. Dutch filmmaker Nanouk Leopold's adaptation of Gerbrand Bakker's bestselling novel moves with such extreme patience that it's borderline experimental, but the atmosphere ultimately provides a vessel for the tragic backstory only revealed once the feelings takes shape. By then, it's nearly an afterthought; "It's All So Quiet" foregrounds mood ahead of its context, universalizing the emotion therein. For long stretches of time, Leopold merely sets the scene, then dwells in it. Middle-aged farmer Helmer (the late Jeroen Willems in one of his final credited projects) spends his long, somber days caring his ailing father Vader (Henri Garcin), a bedridden man frustrated by his extreme reliance on his son for the most basic of needs. In a seeming act of defiance to his demanding.
- 2/8/2013
- by Eric Kohn
- Indiewire
The Berlin International Film Festival -- which kicks off February 7th -- has added a slew of new titles to its Panorama and Berlinale Special programs, including new work form Ken Loach, James Franco, Michael Winterbottom, Shane Carruth, Giuseppe Tornatore and Jane Campion. Many of them having their international premieres after debuting at Sundance (a notable exception being Ken Loach's doc about post-war Britain and tracks the birth of a new socialism, a world premiere), the newly announced films helped complete the Panorama's narrative film program, which previously was announced to include new work from Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Noah Baumbach and Felix van Groeningen. Here is the list of newly announced titles. The Berlinale runs February 7-17, 2012. Panorama fictional films Boven is het stil (It's all so Quiet) - Netherlands/Germany By Nanouk Leopold With Jeroen Willems, Henri Garcin, Wim Opbrouck, Martijn Lakemeier World...
- 1/15/2013
- by Peter Knegt
- Indiewire
Guido van Driel’s dramatic feature film debut “The Resurrection of a Bastard” will open the 42nd International Film Festival Rotterdam on January 23. The film also will compete for the festival’s Hivos Tiger Awards. Yorick van Wageningen, Goua Robert Grovogui, Juda Goslinga and Jeroen Willems star in the story of what happens when an old, vengeful Frisian farmer, a criminal from Amsterdam and an illegal immigrant cross paths. Topkapi Films’ Frans van Gestel and Arnold Heslenfeld produced the project with Dirk Impens and Rudy Verzyck of Menuet. Bas Blokker co-wrote the screenplay with Van Driel. Read More: Rotterdam Announces First Competition Selections For 2013 Festival The film is produced with the support of The Netherlands Film Fund, The Flanders Audiovisual Fund and the Media Programme of the European Union. “We are extremely glad to present 'The Resurrection of a Bastard' as our Official Opening Film and in our...
- 12/13/2012
- by Jay A. Fernandez
- Indiewire
Dutch graphic novelist Guido van Driel is taking the director's reins for The Resurrection Of A Bastard, an adaptation of his own graphic novel Om mekaar in Dokkum. Yorick van Wageningen, Juda Goslinga, Goua Robert Grovogui, Rian Gerritsen, Juliette van Ardenne, and Jeroen Willems star in what promises to be a gritty, multi strand crime film.A criminal from Amsterdam barely surviving a liquidation.An old Frisian farmer bent on revenge.An illegal immigrant with uncertain prospects.Eventually, they meet under an ancient oak tree.Beyond the last town. In production now, you can see the first image from the film above....
- 11/9/2012
- Screen Anarchy
A normal life was never an option for Lena. Whether a translation tick or a telling line throughout the film, the words “Be normal” crop up often as none of the characters traveling in and out of this young girl’s life come close to the definition. Raised by a prostitute mother constantly belittles her for being fat when not on the phone yelling in Polish about her dying, pimp father, Lena has nothing to her name but pain and suffering. Between the ridicule at home and the snickering looks from kids her age outside, the only reprieve she’s allowed is a Thursday night line-dancing class with best friend Hanneke … and sex. But as the opening sequence shows us in what’s eventually proven to be over-used slow motion, this physical act holds no passion or desire. Like her tempestuous guardian, sex serves only to drowning her in the dull,...
- 9/9/2011
- by jpraup@gmail.com (thefilmstage.com)
- The Film Stage
Our friends over at Obsessed with Film have a brand new trailer for Carice van Houten’s new movie, Love Life. The trailer does a great job of telling the story of the movie which if you watch the red band version of this trailer, you’ll realise it seems to have rather a lot of sex in it!
Love Life (or the dutch title ‘Stricken’ also stars Barry Atsma, Anna Drijver, Jeroen Willems, Pierre Bokma, Eline Van der Velden, Sacha Bulthuis and is directed by Reinout Oerlemans. The movie is based on the novel called ‘A Woman Goes to the Doctor’ (Komt Een Vrouw bij de Dokter) which tell us has been translated into no less than 26 languages.
Synopsis: Stijn loves life and life loves him. He’s got his own business, a wonderful daughter and Carmen, his beautiful wife. There’s no need for her to know that...
Love Life (or the dutch title ‘Stricken’ also stars Barry Atsma, Anna Drijver, Jeroen Willems, Pierre Bokma, Eline Van der Velden, Sacha Bulthuis and is directed by Reinout Oerlemans. The movie is based on the novel called ‘A Woman Goes to the Doctor’ (Komt Een Vrouw bij de Dokter) which tell us has been translated into no less than 26 languages.
Synopsis: Stijn loves life and life loves him. He’s got his own business, a wonderful daughter and Carmen, his beautiful wife. There’s no need for her to know that...
- 10/22/2010
- by David Sztypuljak
- HeyUGuys.co.uk
Getty Andriessen
Last night marked the New York concert premiere of Louis Andriessen’s La Commedia, the Dutch composer’s 2008 “film opera” of five sections based on Dante’s epic poem, at Carnegie Hall’s Stern Auditorium. The Asko | Schoenberg ensemble, conducted by Reinbert de Leeuw, powered through Andriessen’s kinetic, textured score — injected with long stretches of jazz and big-band rhythms and even some driving “hard rock” riffs. Synergy Vocals and the Brooklyn Youth Chorus provided a strong choral foundation, engaging with the characters of “The Divine Comedy” as they journeyed from the City of Dis to Paradiso, covering a libretto in four different languages (English, Dutch, Latin, Italian) along the way.
Cristina Zavalloni sang the role of Dante, whipping her long, thin body about the stage. Also trained as a jazz singer, Zavalloni was singing a part composed especially for her; she’ll next star in Andriessen’s opera about Anais Nin,...
Last night marked the New York concert premiere of Louis Andriessen’s La Commedia, the Dutch composer’s 2008 “film opera” of five sections based on Dante’s epic poem, at Carnegie Hall’s Stern Auditorium. The Asko | Schoenberg ensemble, conducted by Reinbert de Leeuw, powered through Andriessen’s kinetic, textured score — injected with long stretches of jazz and big-band rhythms and even some driving “hard rock” riffs. Synergy Vocals and the Brooklyn Youth Chorus provided a strong choral foundation, engaging with the characters of “The Divine Comedy” as they journeyed from the City of Dis to Paradiso, covering a libretto in four different languages (English, Dutch, Latin, Italian) along the way.
Cristina Zavalloni sang the role of Dante, whipping her long, thin body about the stage. Also trained as a jazz singer, Zavalloni was singing a part composed especially for her; she’ll next star in Andriessen’s opera about Anais Nin,...
- 4/16/2010
- Speakeasy/Wall Street Journal
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