Johan Leysen

Mark suffers from an intense form of self-hatred, which translates into neglectful, chilling and destructive behaviour. Mark lives in an equally destructive and hateful town. The only exception is his dying grandfather who lives in a hospice. In the hospice, Mark meets Lisa, a nurse. Mark’s behaviour frees her from her angelic yoke, but their bizarre bond slowly starts spinning out of control.

Matt, an influencer and young parent to newborn Julius, discovers a dark secret from his dementing father's past. He starts an in-depth investigation, which consequently opens a Pandora's box of secrets and unravels more family dramas than anticipated. Matt's wife, Liv, is deeply concerned and will do everything in her power not to lose him, but is it too late..?

A young woman struggles to cope with her elderly father's out-of-the-blue announcement he considers his life complete and will end it by his next birthday.

La historia del austriaco Franz Jägerstätter, objetor de conciencia, que se negó a luchar para los nazis durante la Segunda Guerra Mundial y acabó siendo ejecutado por ellos en 1943, para ser declarado mártir y beatificado por la Iglesia.

En Verderonne, un pequeño pueblo a pocos kilómetros de París, Claire Darling (Catherine Deneuve) despierta el primer día de verano decidida a deshacerse de todas sus pertenencias. Convencida de que es su último día de vida, organiza un mercadillo en el jardín de su mansión con todos sus antigüedades y objetos de valor. Una multitud de vecinos acuden atraídos por los precios ridículos de los objetos. Cada venta y cada encuentro reaviva en Claire recuerdos de su resplandeciente aunque también trágica vida. Esta última locura fuerza el regreso de su hija Marie (Chiara Mastroianni), con la que no tiene contacto desde que esta decidió marcharse de casa hace ya más de veinte años.

Pamela, a young Roma, insolent, spontaneous and funny, embarks on a journey into the unknown, breaking away from the traditions that suffocate her. She arrives in Belgium with three words of French and the hope that marriage will change her and her daughter’s destiny.

What on earth can an adult, childless man write to a kindergarten class? When a lone wolf finds a balloon with a note attached, he seizes the opportunity to pass on his hard-learned life lessons to the unknown infant that sent it. Lessons that do not necessarily line up with a pre-schooler’s experiences, but which may be valuable to him or her at a later age. In the process, unconnected generations find each other in this moving short film, based on a story by Tommy Wieringa.

When her mother abandons her dementing father, Alex unexpectedly finds herself at a crossroads. As she moves back in the parental house to look after her father, she starts questioning her own life. Does she want to stay with her adulterous husband? She tolerated his affairs for years, but is she really happy with him? Or should she, like her parents, drop the facade?

Frank Valken (Olivier Gourmet), un criminal belga, reúne a su viejo equipo para llevar a cabo un último trabajo antes de retirarse por completo. La situación se complica cuando un juez muere al recibir un disparo durante la misión, y la policía no duda en señalar a Frank y sus compañeros como los principales sospechosos del asesinato. Sin embargo, cuando la detective Tesla (Lubna Azabal) ahonda en el caso descubre que es más complejo de lo que aparentaba, al revelar irregularidades y encubrimientos por parte de varios miembros corruptos de la policía. Dicha información sugiere la inocencia de Valken y le deja claro a Tesla que, para resolver el caso, no puede confiar absolutamente en nadie.

An old man who isolated himself from civilization receives an unexpected visitor.

Alice leads a routine life as an escort and dodges social contact. When she's forced to take care of her son after the death of her ex, her apparent indifference seems to fade away and she gets confronted with her emotional emptiness.

A former European song contest singer, fading away in a pâté factory, falls in love with a young, aspiring boxer. Together, they decide she should attempt a comeback.

Ben es enviado a prisión tras causar un accidente de coche en el que murió su novia. Cuando, después de un largo tiempo, regresa a Waldstille, su ciudad natal en el sur de Holanda, debe hacer frente a sus suegros, que obtuvieron la custodia de su hija. Los suegros pretenden impedir que Ben vea a su hija de nuevo. Pero Ben está decidido a recuperar el tiempo perdido con Cindy.

1948 - Louis-Ferdinand Céline in Denmark, in exile, accused of collaboration with the Nazis during the occupation of the France. He is accompanied by Lucette, his wife and his cat Bebert.

Lens regresa a París para encontrar a su único y verdadero amor, Madeleine. Allí conoce a Helen, una enfermera que perdió a su hijo pequeño y le resulta muy difícil recuperarse de esta tragedia. Una historia de amor comienza en medio de una pasión dolorosa, de celos y autodestrucción.

¿Qué pasaría si Dios existiese...y viviese en Bruselas? Dios en la tierra es un cobarde, con patéticos códigos morales y odioso con su familia. Su hija, Ea, se aburre en casa y no puede soportar estar encerrada en ese pequeño apartamento en la ordinaria Bruselas, hasta que un día decide rebelarse contra su padre, entra en su ordenador y le dice a todo el mundo el día en el que morirá, con lo que hace que de repente todos se pongan a pensar que hacer con los días, meses, o años que les quedan por vivir.

With his wife in labor, father-to-be Thomas (Malik Zidi) speeds to the hospital, and in the process, accidentally kills a young man on the road. That death sets into motion events that will change everyone’s lives forever, including the young man’s mother Marie-France (Nathalie Baye), who cannot recover from the trauma. Nine years later, Marie-France takes a job as Thomas’s secretary without him knowing about her connection to his past. As Marie-France’s maternal rage reaches tragic proportions, she insinuates herself into his life, his work and his family in this classic thriller à la Hitchcock.

The suffocating love between between a father and a son who, as modern outlaws, struggle to survive in the depleted and neglected southern Dutch province of Limburg.

2 November 2004, shortly before nine in the morning. In The Hague, the report comes in that in Amsterdam Theo van Gogh has been murdered. All warning bells start ringing. With the country in flames, sometimes literally, politicians and officials in The Hague have to neutralise all sorts of known and unknown stings, and just when Van Gogh’s cremation seems to herald a period of relative peace, a second explosion follows: the attack on the Hofstad Network in the Laakkwartier in The Hague. A reconstruction of nine days of political high tension and flying dust, a decade after the assassination of the trendsetting filmmaker and TV presenter.

Margo ha abandonado su brillante carrera como músico por Furio. Furio, por su parte, debe lograr la restauración de un hotel en condiciones imposibles. Tensiones y obstáculos se van acumulando, mientras la fecha de la inauguración se va acercando.

De camino a casa Luc y su mujer son testigos de un intento de robo. Luc interviene y el ladrón lo deja inconsciente. Tres semanas después, se despierta y recibe la trágica noticia de la muerte de su mujer durante el incidente. Luc consigue identificar al culpable, que es detenido y juzgado, pero debido a un error procesal es puesto en libertad por el jurado. A partir de ese momento su única obsesión será la venganza.

'Joven y bonita' es un retrato de una joven de 17 años, interpretada por Marine Vacth (Ce que le jour doit à la nuit) a lo largo de cuatro largas temporadas con cuatro canciones como telón de fondo. Una historia narrada subjetivamente por la protagonista, una chica obsesionada con el sexo, la pasión y el deseo carnal hasta el punto de convertirlo en una forma de vida, que le atrapa en una espiral de lujuria de la que no puede escapar.

Her mother has just died. Her father is not what she had thought. Caught between an uncertain past, which she knows only through the photographs her mother has left behind, and the prospect of a marriage that she does not really want, Elisa sets out to discover the truth. But will she recognize it when she finds it?

As a veteran of the Latin-American guerilla wars, Pierre Goldman became a mythical figure of the French protest movement of the '60s.

Lucrecia es asesina a sueldo. Especializada en el uso de venenos y apasionada de ópera, tendrá que cumplir un contrato difícil en el corazón de los Alpes suizos.

In 1430, Joan of Arc, the prisoner of a powerful lord of the north of France is sold to the English. As a captive awaiting her death, she is approached by different men for whom she is believed to be the embodiment of the infinite.

ANTWERP CENTRAL takes the viewer on a journey through the physical and mental space of Antwerp’s railway cathedral, from its construction to the present day. The film covers three centuries of Belgian railway history: from the moment that the national railway company laid its first tracks to the development of the high-speed rail link in the 21st century. Echoes of Belgium’s colonial past and the location of the station in the centre of the bustling diamond district and next to the city zoo add a surreal touch as contrasting pairs, such as animal and human, nature and industry, baroque and modernity, dilapidation and renovation are complexly juxtaposed.

Jack es un mercenario solitario, un auténtico maestro entre asesinos. Pero, cuando un trabajo en Suecia no acaba tan bien como estaba previsto para este estadounidense en el extranjero, Jack le deja claro a su contacto que su próxima misión será la última. Se traslada entonces a Italia, donde se refugia en un pueblecito y empieza a disfrutar lejos de la muerte. Una mujer belga, Mathilde, le comunica que su próxima misión tiene que ver con la fabricación de un arma. Jack se sorprende a sí mismo trabando amistad con el párroco del pueblo y teniendo un romance. Pero al salir de las sombras, puede que Jack esté tentando al destino.

A biography of the Belgian nun Jeannine Deckers, who became a popular singer in the early 1960s and struggled with the contradiction between the church and her true self.

Bélgica /// Jonas es un chico de dieciséis años, aquejado por el fracaso escolar y cuya única vía de salvación es el tenis. Sin embargo, su fracaso se extiende a su deporte favorito justo cuando se encontraba a las puertas de la selección nacional. Un día conoce a Pierre, un famoso maestro que decide hacerse cargo de él. Pronto formarán una estrecha relación, convirtiéndose en la única vía de escape a sus problemas familiares. No obstante, la educación que Jonas recibe de Pierre traspasará los límites de lo académico y llegará hasta el terreno sexual.

West Point is a 'film noir', a story of family and emigration. It's La Cabo da Rocha, Portugal, the western-most point of the European continent. Opposite the USA, it's a metaphor of Ellis Island. It's the street dances and it's the part of what has been forgotten that Alexander and his sister Jeanne must accept in order to break free from the original crime, the feeling of abandonment and the color of wheat.

Tiuri, un joven de 16 años, arriesga su futuro como caballero cuando recibe un encargo de otro caballero agonizante. Debe entregar una carta al Rey de Unauwen en el más completo de los secretos. Su aventura le llevará a atravesar montañas, bosques y valles, donde el peligro acecha en cada rincón. Bajo ninguna circunstancia esa carta ha de caer en las manos equivocadas.

A confused old man, Henry, lives on his own in an old empty building that is reminiscent of a deserted palace. Henry hasn't been outside for years. The camera follows a day in his life - his simple daily chores and his eccentric rituals. Henry looks like a European from a good family, but has many Asian habits. The second protagonist is the building in which Henry is staying: the Royal Pavilion in Brighton. It is one of the best preserved examples of chinoise architecture and furnishing in the world. Neither the client nor the architect had ever set foot in Asia. In a monologue, a parallel narrative unfolds in a game with reality and fiction. Word and image, fiction and documentary become intertwined with each other and point across the frontiers of ‘East’ versus ‘West’.

A reporter who's soon to receive the Journalist of the Year Award hits a young hare on his way home. He gets out of the car to see if it's ok, but the hare runs off deeper into the forest, taking him on adventure of self-discovery.

Claire, 38, works in the litigation department of a bank. She has to deal with the case of Jacques Marey, 50, the boy she secretly loved when she was a 12-year-old. Today, Claire lives with Antoine and their daughter, Lola, 13, who falls in love with Julien, 22, Jacques's son. Like Mother like daughter ? Love stories usually end badly, but they don't necessarily repeat themselves!

Carmen, a bonobo female, flees from the research center in linguistics where she is being kept. She takes refuge at a young couple's place, Mercier and his pregnant wife Myriam. Mercier, beginning at a new job, is reluctant to welcome the ape. But Myriam makes friend with her.

The tender and supporting relationship between a young woman and her gay husband, in WW2.

One cold winter's day, Jacob and his sister Marie are abandoned in a wood by their out of work father. In his jacket Jacob finds a letter from their mother urging them to go to her brother in Spain. Once in Spain, it turns out that their uncle is dead. Marie meets Diego, a wealthy charming Spanish surgeon, and falls in love with him. Diego lives with his sick, domineering sister, Teresa. To Jacob's astonishment, Marie wants to marry Diego. Even after the wedding has taken place, jealous Jacob tries to get his sister away from Diego. When this doesn't succeed, Jacob starts to provoke his brother-in-law. It soon transpires that no one will go unpunished for this.

Dito Tsintsadze's drama focuses on a loner whose life changes dramatically, when he gets to know a beautiful, but strange girl. Lukas, a young man doing "meals on wheels" instead of military service, doesn't have many friends and leads a boring life, until he meets Isabella. The fascinating girl soon becomes his best friend, but Lukas learns she has a sexual relationship to her stepfather. Thus, he is obsessed with the idea of delivering Isabella by killing the man..

Claire es una chica muy joven de buena familia cuya vida se complica al enamorarse de un traficante de drogas afgano.

De Enclave is a Dutch mini series about the mass murders in Srebrenica during the Bosnia war. It tells a part of the Bosnia war, personalized in Ibro Hadzic, who lost all of his family there.

En Berlín, el detective Minks (Christian Redl) recorre el mundo de las salas de tatuajes para encontrar a un asesino que siente especial debilidad por la piel de sus víctimas. Un thriller de terror al estilo de "Seven".

Anita tiene doce años y está asustada. Se ha escapado de su casa y su madre es una peligrosa asesina que la quiere recuperar a toda costa. La policía no puede ayudarla: es menor de edad y está bajo la tutela de su madre. Hugo tiene cuarenta años y se acaba de retirar de su profesión de mercenario, pero su vida se cruza con la de Anita. Deberá retrasar su futuro unos días para salvar la vida de Anita...

Gévaudan, en la Francia del siglo XVIII. Una monstruosa criatura devora salvajemente a los habitantes del lugar. Recién llegado de América, Grégoire de Fronsac recibe el encargo del rey Luis XV de identificar y encontrar a la fiera. Sin embargo Grégorie y su misterioso hermano de sangre, un indio llamado Mani, intentarán descubrir qué hay detrás de estos sucesos...

Student Eric kills time by spying on his neighbors. Compulsively taking notes on everything within binocular range from his bedroom window, he harasses his neighbors by sending unsigned notes and making their private affairs public. When they discover his identity and draw him in, will this release him from his solitude, or confirm in his mind that he will always be the outsider?

El filme narra narra la relación entre el Rey Sol (Luis XIV) y el compositor de su corte Lully.

Johan has three children with different women. Two adult daughters: Sophie and Virginie, and a young son in Amsterdam. Loïc gave Johan diamonds of a criminal origin. Her husband Simon thought they were his and murdered her. Then he set out his hunt for the diamonds and for killing Johan. The police thought that Johan had murdered Loïc and called his daughters, who had not known about each other. Afterwards Sophie receives a note to take a certain train to Amsterdam. A young boy gives Virginie the oral message "The treasure is in the trout". She immediately understands that this trout must be in her mother's freezer, unknown to the mother. Both girls take the train. Simon contacts them as a helpful fellow-passenger. The girls soon detect his aim of murdering them. In Brussels they escape the train. Virginie steals a car but is not as good at driving as at stealing (she will prove this again).

Jascha Steg, un violonchelista mundialmente conocido, se encuentra en un momento de su vida en el que la gloria ya no significa nada para él. Durante una gira internacional, sus padres, a quienes no ha visto desde hace tiempo, deciden ir a verle actuar. Allí se encuentran con Lulú Kreutz, una antigua amiga de toda la vida. Ella será la encargada de organizar un gran encuentro. Jascha, sus padres, su tío, Lulú y su gran amor, la violinista Anna

Nag, a prostitute, walks the streets. One night, a violent man sends her to the hospital. There she meets Herve, a nurse obsessed with people's age and death in general. He falls madly in love with Nag and enters a world that amounts to very little.

A young boy develops a passion for archeology and tries to unravel the truth about his ancestry.

October 1997. Paul Winters (35) is deputy public prosecutor in Arnhem and is working on his first major case: an investigation in to the allegations of a Bosnian girl that she was raped by three soldiers in the Dutch UN contingent and whose brother is alleged to have been killed by them. Winters suspects that the girl is telling the truth, but he can't prove it and the case is adjourned. Then one of the men gives a revealing statement that throws a different light on the case. Winters argues in favour of reopening the case, but faces opposition from an unexpected quarter.

Durante la Segunda Guerra Mundial (1939-1945), con el objetivo de huir de los nazis y evitar el exterminio, un grupo de judíos de un pueblo de Europa del Este organiza un convoy simulando que se trata de un tren de prisioneros. Algunos de ellos no tendrán más remedio que hacerse pasar por soldados nazis.

Madeleine is with her lover, Jean-Paul, when her husband arrives home and catches the two together. Madeleine kills her husband and tells Jean-Paul to flee before the police arrive. After Jean-Paul drives away, he picks up a hitchhiker. When the car, stolen by the hitchhiker, explodes, police believe the dead hitchhiker is Jean-Paul. Madeleine takes up with Jean-Paul's brother, Bastien, while Jean-Paul, arriving in Strasbourg, is mistaken for the heir to a fortune. The detective on the case spends more time writing crime novels than investigating real-life crimes.

A causa de una intriga política, el ministro británico James Morton es enviado a Bruselas como comisario de la Unión Europea. A través de una serie de documentos que recibe clandestinamente, descubre que una poderosa compañía alemana fabrica productos altamente tóxicos. Este asunto podría ser una oportunidad para que Morton recuperase el prestigio perdido. (FILMAFFINITY)

Tragic love story about the photographer and explorer Felice Beato who travelled back to Japan in 1895 to seek his former wife O-Kiku. On the way he describes in a nostalgic letter to his brother how much he yearns for his lost love O-Kiku and how impotent he feels in an ancient Japan subject to rapid change. The journey takes him to Nagasaki and Moji, Onomichi, Mount Fuji, Yokohama and Tokyo. Places he once visited with his beloved and where he now no longer understands the people. Felice...Felice... is inspired by hand-coloured nineteenth century photos taken by e.g. Felice Beato, Sjimooka Renjo and Baron von Stilfried. In this film, shot entirely in a studio, the photos depict Felice's journey. Awarded the Golden Calf for Best Feature film in 1998. (NFF)

Under pressure from his publisher, Russian novelist Fyodor Dostoyevsky gets work on his latest piece, 'Rouletenberg'. In the 27 days it takes for him to complete the novel reality and fiction become blurred; in this feverish atmosphere of excess Dostoyevsky's characters come to life as he struggles to complete his work.

Todos los hombres de la familia McBee sufren una misteriosa enfermedad y necesitan un trasplante de órganos. El donante perfecto es Tykho Moon, que probablemente ha sido asesinado, aunque según ciertos rumores sigue vivo.

The story of the year the Oxford and Cambridge boat race changed from a gentleman's race to one where winning was everything.

A series of seemingly unconnected events and 50 important speaking parts make this film a jigsaw puzzle to be solved by the viewer. Martin and Claire were separated in childhood, and are brought together by a series of coincidences. A tragic car crash is central to the story, but seemingly unimportant events can hold great significance. Through a montage of different film stock and techniques director Diane Bertrand creates pieces of a puzzle, from which the viewer has to piece together a story. That's the premise of the film, and it is solvable. You just have to work a bit...

Jeanne, her second husband, Michel, and her teen daughter Marie live quietly in the South of France. However, Jeanne's secret past comes back to haunt her.

París, Reino de Francia, 18 de agosto de 1572. Con el propósito de evitar el estallido de una guerra religiosa, la princesa católica Margarita de Valois, hermana del débil rey Carlos IX, se casa con el rey hugonote Enrique III de Navarra.

After the war, in Bucharest, a young Romanian poet arrested for having written an article denouncing Stalinist crimes, will save his life by accepting to become a hostage of the regime.

Alemania, 1939. Cuando Adolf Hitler está a punto de conducir a su país a la guerra, imponiendo una dura disciplina que niega la libertad individual, grupos de jóvenes alemanes, entusiasmados por la pasión política y el mensaje de libertad de la música swing americana, se rebelan contra ese orden. Conocidos como los "Chicos del Swing", imitan la última moda inglesa y americana: llevan abrigos demasiado grandes, sombreros hongo, paraguas negros y el pelo largo. Su pasión por la exuberancia del baile se basa en un gran conocimiento de la música, y lo que empieza siendo una inocente rebelión juvenil, se convierte en una peligrosa rebelión política contra la amenazante marea nazi.

En la localidad belga de Aalst se inicia una revuelta para protestar por las duras condiciones de los obreros de las fábricas. Cuando el religioso Adolf Daens escribe un artículo denunciando estos hechos, su repercusión es tal que no sólo acaba enfrentándose al Papa León XIII, sino también a la necesidad final de elegir entre el sacerdocio y la actividad política. (FILMAFFINITY)

Six people are about to undertake a journey by foot from the very north of the Netherlands to the very south, in search of the mountains. Only two of them reach the destination.

Maria Garcia (Carmen Maura) is a television journalist and she's about to be a single mother. Her career foremost in her mind, she doesn't slow down even for a minute, despite her pregnancy. She is, however, taking Lamaze classes and is quite competently coping with the romantic attentions of a man she's not very interested in. It's not at all irrelevant that her news beat includes stories on terrorism, the greenhouse effect, pollution and genetic engineering, because when her baby's due date comes and goes, she starts hearing from her infant from in the womb. It is telling her that it and many other babies are refusing to be born into such a horrible world. She learns that this is true, and that the children born through induced labor are dying.

According to an ancient Indian tale a giant monster embryo residing in a crystal vase is predetermined to fertilize a blue-eyed woman. She will give birth to something evil to unleash horror and destruction upon human kind. Ugly septuplet brothers reproduced within the framework of mysterious genetic experiments terrorize a young innocent girl who seems to be chosen for the sinister predestination.

This melodramatic film follows Eline Vere, as she attempts to break free from the confines of her narrow existence in The Hague through three tumultuous and ultimately disastrous courtships. Adaptation of Louis Couperus' novel Eline Vere.

She's a lawyer with a social conscience. He's a calculating industrialist who keeps many deals hidden from her. But when she discovers that her husband is involved in illegal arms traffic and is also having an affair with one of her colleagues, a direct confrontation ensues.

After seven months of pregnancy a husband and wife learn that their unborn child won't survive for long.

Hilde earns just enough to support herself and her son, but when his father returns the troubles begin.

Joachim Dallayrac, un famoso barítono ya mayor, está en el ocaso de su carrera y decide retirarse. Además está gravemente enfermo. Antes de su alejamiento da clases a dos jóvenes talentos, Sophie y Jean.

Siglo XVI. Una vez que el duque de Alba aplastó la rebelión de Flandes contra España, Felipe II (1559-1598) restringió la libertad religiosa, aplicó los decretos del Concilio de Trento y reforzó el poder de la Inquisición en esas tierras. En este contexto, llega a Brujas con documentación falsa el venerable escritor y filósofo Zenón Ligre. Tras fundar una clínica y unas termas, se dispone a trabajar como médico y alquimista para los más pobres. El pensamiento y los métodos de Zenón, que se apartan de la ortodoxia oficial, tienen un gran éxito entre la población flamenca, pero corren el riesgo de ser condenados por la Inquisición. (FILMAFFINITY)

A young man falls in love with extra-liberated Giulia. Their relationship becomes very passionate, but Giulia has no limits in her sexual fantasies and games. Poor guy, will soon discover he'll have to pay a price for Giulia. He'll have to put up with all her strange and pervert desires, until of course he reaches his limits.

One year after their father has died mysteriously at the Wadden Sea, two brothers visit the same place where their father died. Hidden feelings about each other come to the foreground.

Two very different friends who share an apartment in Amsterdam have reached a dead end in their lives. The arrival of a parcel looks like an opportunity for a change.

A woman and her daughter lives in Oostdijk, a village near Amsterdam. One night when the mother is on her way home, she is killed in a car accident in the street they live in.

María es una joven normal que juega al baloncesto y que ayuda a su padre en una gasolinera. Un día María descubre un día que está embarazada, a pesar de no haberse acostado con ningún hombre, ni siquiera con su novio José, un taxista que no puede creerse que pueda tener un hijo siendo su novia virgen.

A murderer is at large: a well-dressed businessman incarcerates his victims, chains and starves them, and documents their death amid their filth with Instamatic snaps. Meanwhile, in another part of town, a woman joins a brothel...

Director Leon de Winter has taken a thriller with political and psychological overtones, and scrambled it into a series of vignettes that are mixed-up in time and in location, thereby dashing any hope of following the story. A journalist goes to a southern European country to interview a well-known terrorist who has refused to stop his activities even though the revolution he fought for ended successfully five years earlier. Questions are raised about adopting violence as a way of life without at first realizing it and about the seeming impossibility of raising the consciousness of backwater cultures. Perhaps because of the way the story has been filleted into fragments, characters like the journalist and terrorist do not have enough continuous screen time to build up their individuality, a second factor that makes it difficult to become involved in the drama.

Unrelenting pessimism dominates this slow-paced, dark film, the debut feature from director Digna Sinke dedicated to an archetypal born loser named Marian (Josee Ruiter). Marian is a journalist who has been working in Latin America and who arrives home just after her father dies to find out that the man she had married for purely political reasons might be deported because the authorities found out he was not living with her. Meanwhile, Marian is upset that her mother and sister are keeping her mentally handicapped brother in an institution, and she goes there to get him released into her custody -- a mistake it turns out. He is actually worse off with her, and vice-versa. On top of everything, Marian cannot break away from the depression she feels over a tragic incident that happened while she was in Latin America -- and anything she does is colored by that moment from the past. These burdens become almost too much to bear, both for Marian and the viewers.

Koekebakker is a successful journalist. His old mates, however, turned out failures: Bekker has lost all hope of changing the world, Hoyer works for the socialist party, Bavink suffers from mental problems and Kees is a simple laborer.

Martin (Heinz Bennent), a sculptor, is dying in his bed on a barge that floats along a fog-shrouded waterway. As he agonizingly descends into a final oblivion, his second wife is at his bedside, comforted by his first wife -- also present.

During the second world war law student Hannie Schaft is a member of the Dutch resistance movement.

Fred, a 28-year-old bachelor from a quiet village in the Ardennes, is forester and grave digger. He is in love with Isabel but she has always loved their childhood friend Peter. Then Peter returns after a failed marriage.