Adri Schrover

"What does the animal see when it looks at me?" Three animals and a woman in an enclosed space. As they study each other, their own methods of communication create a wordless conversation. We view them in close-up and from various perspectives, with the woman as a solitary species in this universe.

“There Is No Path” follows legendary director Heddy Honigmann on a real and spiritual journey. Today, facing a terminal illness, she will travel to her country of birth, Peru and through Europe revisiting all the important places and moments of her life, richly illustrated with clips of her films. Is it a farewell journey in which she lets go of her family, her loved ones and her work? Or is it a celebration of life? Her travelling companion is taxi driver Hussein, a refugee from Iraq with whom Heddy has a tight bond. As they trace Heddy’s family history they find many common themes. They are no longer taxi driver and customer, but two souls who each find joy in life in the face of adversity. It is a life affirming film about universal connection and comfort.

The Gert & Hermien Story shows the rise and fall of one of the most popular singing duos in Dutch history: Gert & Hermien Timmerman. Their career has seen great heights and deep valleys. Their personal lives, which were marked by scandals, were always widely covered in the tabloids. Daughter Sandra, along with some other intimates and confidants of Gert and Hermien, is our guide in the unlikely story of her narcissistic, manipulative father and driven mother.

Walking in the forest without being able to see, coming down the stairs or going shopping when one is paralysed, falling asleep with post-traumatic stress disorder: for the protagonists of Buddy, all of this is made possible by the presence of an assistance dog at their side. Edith, 86 years old and blind since adolescence, remembers all of the dogs she has had with her, and their portraits—even if she cannot see them—cover the walls of her house.

We think we know what ethnic profiling is, but what does it feel like? Dutch citizens report on at times bizarre and disconcerting experiences with police checks, where their skin colour routinely makes them suspicious. For years, the police has been aiming to proactively execute security checks in order to arrest more riff-raff. But practise shows that Dutch people with a migration background are regularly stopped without any suspicion of criminal offences. Poignantly, the teacher, the soldier, the lawyer, the rapper, the fellow police officer and other coloured Dutchmen talk about helplessness, frustration, humiliation, alienation, anger and what it feels like to be a suspect from the start. Wry, but insightful indictment of ethnic profiling.

Doing really well on your school assessment tests, but still having the school recommend that you go to preparatory vocational school. Going to a club with friends and having the bouncer keep you out. Having to endure jokes from classmates. These are examples of the sort of casual racism that the children of director Karin Junger and their friends have to face. In Ik alleen in de klas, director Karin Junger, white mother of three darker-skinned children, stands with her family to confront the racism they experience in their daily lives. Twelve adolescents meet at a mansion in France. The group consists of Junger’s children and their friends. All of them come from ethnic minority backgrounds and share a feeling of being excluded from Dutch society. Re-enactment is used to explore painful situations again. In this simple but effective documentary, we can see the impact of subtle and less subtle forms of racism on the lives of young Dutch people.

Following her mother's death, an 11-year-old indigenous Australian girl named Shay moves with her father and brother to Belgium. Shay finds that her grief is readily accepted in her new town, which still bears scars from World War I.

At the end of 2003 the main building of the Amsterdam Rijksmuseum has closed, in the words of managing director Ronald de Leeuw, becoming 'the most conceivable art museum'. The Spanish architects Cruz and Ortiz signed for the big design; in 2008 the modernized museum would open with a pioneering museum concept. Moviemaker Hoogendijk followed the first four years of what is called the biggest Dutch cultural operation in history.

Alan Lomax (1915-2002) was a song collector who recorded ordinary people, who gave their heart and soul in front of his microphone. The film maker decides to search for people Lomax recorded, travelling through Europe in an old Volkswagen. His journey leads him past desolate Scottish islands, through the withered interior of Spain and to isolated Italian mountain villages. The search is combined with conversations with colleagues and friends of Lomax. Throughout the movie, every now and then we return to a frail but happy 86-year old Lomax. In this passionate and musical roadmovie we slowly discover why folk music can be so pretty and what could have once possessed the legendary Alan Lomax.

Jakob Yzermans is an American salesman looking for his roots in Rotterdam. He thinks his father (Hendrik Yzermans) has left Holland with the money he took from his collegues. Jakob is trying to get the money together to repay the money. While doing so he encounters more and more problems.

Jakob Yzermans is an American salesman looking for his roots in Rotterdam. He thinks his father (Hendrik Yzermans) has left Holland with the money he took from his collegues. Jakob is trying to get the money together to repay the money. While doing so he encounters more and more problems.

Elderly brothers Pierre and Willie Pittie still live together in their parental home in Bemelen, and are members of almost every local club. The small village of Bemelen resides five kilometres away from Maastricht and gradually changes under pressure of city officials and the rising tourist industry. A loving portrait of a small Limburg community against the backdrop of big, societal changes.