Celebrating Cinema

With an oeuvre-spanning exhibition in Eye Filmmuseum, and multiple classics like Fitzcarraldo (1982) and Aguirre, Wrath Of God (1972) returning to the big screens of LAB111, we sit down to discuss the ‘ecstatic truths’ and brilliant fictions of German film auteur par excellence: Werner Herzog.

Show Notes & Films Mentioned

With the multidisciplinary film program Witch Way Now: Recasting A Feminist Icon heading into its second month of film screenings, talks, workshops, and performances at LAB111 and Paradiso, we invite Witch Way Now co-curator Helena Castro to discuss in-depth the depiction of the witch and witchcraft in cinema. Is the witch a feminist icon? How has the image and interpretation of the witch changed over the decades? And what can we learn about representation through these cinematic perspectives? This and more on this very open-hearted and therefore hour-long episode of Celebrating Cinema.

The Witch Way Now film program — a collaboration of LAB111 and Paradiso — will run until the end of June and features such films as La Passion de Jeanne d’Arc (1928), The Wizard Of Oz (1939), The Love Witch (2016), Suspiria (1977), Kiki’s Delivery Service (1989) and Belladonna Of Sadness (1973), alongside various in-depth talks, introductions by experts, a Häxan live score performance by ambient duo Wanderwelle, a wicked season closing party and much more. For more information and tickets: www.lab111.nl/witch.

Show notes & Films Mentioned

For the final Future Frames episode, filmmaker Kiriko Mechanicus talks with fellow filmmaker and good friend Razan Hassan, an upcoming documentarist who has recently won the Best Documentary Film award at the Shortcutz Film Festival for her film 'In Between Glass and Walls'.

In their tender conversation, Hassan speaks about her teenage love for director Bernardo Bertolucci, the depths of the Syrian new wave, the urge to create from pain, and her upcoming film 'On The Edge Of Life I Saw A Film'.

Sitting down with filmmaker, screenwriter, chef, and all-around powerhouse Amira Duynhouwer for a Future Frames interview, film critic Hugo Emmerzael dives into Duynhouwer’s wildly prolific career, her initial love for cinema and the tough lessons she had to learn to make it as a successful film professional.

Ranging from Spielberg to Akira Kurosawa, from industry secrets to cinema inspirations, and from kitchen struggles to biographical cinema, this frank and fun conversation covers a lot of ground. What ties all the disparate topics together is an infectious love for good food, good films and good times.

Inspired by the experiences of a close friend, Davy Chou decided to make a film about her non-stereotypical adoption story, the likes of which we hardly ever get to see on screen. Speaking to host Sophie, Chou reflects on directing a film in a country and language that he wasn't familiar with, and the difficult process he went through as a male writer to create the strong Asian female lead character of his second feature film Return to Seoul.

You can find tickets for our screenings of Return to Seoul here.

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Recognizing herself in Stefanie Kolk’s journey towards a career in film that started out in a different place entirely, filmmaker and podcast host Sophie Smeets invited the biophysicists-turned-filmmaker for her Future Frames interview.

In this conversation, we gain an insight into the different elements that play a role in Kolk’s filmmaking. How her love for film started from watching films with her father and how it is still a means of communication and connection for her. She describes how her science background influences the way she approaches her craft and how, after numeral short films, she finally came to make her first feature film, Melk.

For the second interview in our Future Frames series, Head Of Program Tom Ooms and his good friend, Amsterdam-based writer/director Kim Kokosky Deforchaux explore how Kim's childhood obsession with Steven Spielberg's Jurassic Park propelled him to pursue a career in genre-filmmaking.

In this hour-long, frank conversation, we get a glimpse of this future framemaker's trajectory toward becoming a director, after having studied screenwriting at the Dutch Film Academy, how his obsessive movie-watching influenced his own projects, and how his award-winning shorts Ik, Moordenaar and Hantu have made it possible for him to now work towards his first feature film debut.

After watching Ashley Röttjers’ short film Celestial Spaces: A Liberation on Meditation Practices at an IDFA Meets event, Elliot was struck by the elegance and depth of Ashley’s work.

Eager to learn more about this Rotterdam-based photographer turned filmmaker, Elliot invited Ashley as a future framemaker to watch for our Future Frames interviews.

In this candid conversation, Ashley shares how watching a film like Charlie’s Angels as a kid prompted her to pick up the camera and capture her life and that of her friends. From art school to fashion photography, Ashley takes us on a journey marked by her various short films. Inspired to speak in perspectives and frames that are reflective of her own experiences, this intriguing filmmaker on the rise is ready to capture the individuality of black women from joy and beauty to healing and sexuality.

Celebrating the 50th anniversary of Alejandro Jodorowsky's mystical magnum opus The Holy Mountain, three classics by the controversial Chilean surrealist return to cinemas in the Netherlands nationwide. With Sophie replacing producer Elliot, who will be traveling the world for a while, our hosts Tom, Kiriko, and Hugo discuss the impact of 60s and 70s transgressive cinema, the heritage of the counter-culture, where the provoking works of Jodorowsky fit in, and if the spirit of those times and their cultural expressions live on in our current cinematic culture.

You can find tickets for our Jodorowsky screenings here.

With our partners Mubi, you can enjoy 30 days free of handpicked cinema at mubi.com/lab111.

Don't forget to leave us a review & share - the bigger the podcast, the bigger the guests we can have on!

Following our first live and very animated podcast recording, our hosts, along with our audience, discussed the relevance of cult classic Twilight; a film that showcases a darkly stylish depiction of female desire wrapped inside an inherently silly teen vampire romance. Like it or not this romance saga had us hooked from the beginning and was undoubtedly a cinematic marker in all our lives, one way or another. Find out how Twilight shaped our audience’s proclivity to fall for the wrong men, led to creating their own fan club and even a drinking game... did someone say spider-monkey? 

Did you miss our screening of Twilight? There are still screenings available here. 

Don't forget to leave us a review & share - the bigger the podcast, the bigger the guests we can have on!