NLWave25

“Born and raised in the Netherlands as the child of Palestinian parents from a homeland under occupation, I am torn between two worlds and carry with me traumas passed down from generation to generation,” filmmaker Sakir Khader says of his debut feature project Through the Eye of the Falcon, pitched at NLWave25 and produced by mint film office. “As the occupation in Palestine continues and the violence escalates, I have no choice but to capture the injustice through my lens.”

Menno Otten’s new work Still City is an ode to Amsterdam, told entirely through 125 years of archive. “Menno is, quite simply, a magician with archival material, able to find in the smallest glance or gesture a universal rhythm that binds people across decades,” producer Renko Douze tells Business Doc Europe. “This rare quality ensures that the film speaks to anyone who has ever felt the pulse of a city.”

For most of us, the Moon is the beautiful heavenly body that illuminates the night sky, but for Big Industry it is hot property, a place to be colonised for its assets. “Our film about the Moon turned out to be a mirror for what is happening on Earth,” co-director Luuk Bouwman tells Business Doc Europe. “It digs into bigger themes like power and ownership, trust and distrust, distribution of resources, the commons and the private. That makes it a universal story relevant for international audiences.”

Miriam Guttmann’s new film explores how a tragic and unnecessary death sparked a national reckoning on race, class justice and accountability. Sanda, the son of a Senegalese immigrant and a working-class Belgian mother, died during an elite fraternity initiation ceremony in Leuven, Belgium. “This is not a sensationalized crime story, but a deeply human narrative seen through the eyes of Sanda’s family, friends, and the legal and experts involved in the case, providing a unique, multifaceted perspective,” producer Monique Busman of Tomtit Film tells Business Doc Europe.

“In Your Shadow is vital because it makes visible something that exists in so many families and societies: the silence that grows around trauma,” Dutch producer Renko Douze tells BDE of Thabi Mooi & Tom Fassaert’s work-in-progress, In Your Shadow. In the feature doc, after thirty years of silence, filmmaker Thabi takes her father on a journey to confront his past as a soldier in the South African liberation struggle.

The first edition of NLWave kicks off Sept 24, offering a selection of international execs and festival programmers an exclusive first look at the latest cinematic output from the Netherlands. In terms of documentary, eight projects either at early stage or as works-in-progress, will be presented. Additionally, three recently completed feature docs will be screened. Docmakers in the frame include IDFA winners Luuk Bouwman and Tom Fassaert, as well as powerhouse production houses such as Submarine, Baldr Film, 100% and Mint Film Office.

In his new documentary, Tom Fassaert returns to the subject of his family, this time the strained but fascinating relationship between his father Rob and uncle Rene, two men who seem to be polar opposites. “They can’t live without each other and yet when they’re together….” Fassaert sighs as he reflects on the odd couple dynamic between the brothers. “The bittersweet taste - that is what made me make this film.”