Oeroeg & Hantu

The museum for film and the art of the moving image in the Netherlands. Visit the exhibition or cinema and discover our collection with more than 50.000 films.

Eye Filmmuseum

7 February Eye is closed

Hantu (Kim Kokosky Deforchaux, NL 2021, 19’, English subs)

Terrifying demons from the past torment lonely Indonesian widow Lies. She doesn’t like to talk about that past in the Dutch East Indies: she prefers to discuss what’s for dinner tonight with her son Eddy. Featuring Nel Lekatompessy and Martin Schwab (who also appears in Oeroeg).

Oeroeg (Hans Hylkema, NL 1993, 118’, English subs)

Hella Haasse set her debut novel Oeroeg (1948) – about the close friendship between the son of a Dutch plantation boss Johan and ‘native’ boy Oeroeg (Martin Schwab) – in the Dutch East Indies of her youth. The two boys grew up together and don’t seem to notice their different origins. Hylkema added episodes in which the boys face off against one another, both in a personal matter and in the liberation struggle that is just flaring up. Johan (Golden Calf-winner Rik Launspach) is forced to take sides against the people he has felt akin to since he was a child. At the premiere, a discussion arose about the Netherlands’ colonial past and actions, partly as a result of protests from veterans’ organisations, which had expressed their objections even before the film was made. At the time, it was not a generally accepted fact that the Dutch army committed war crimes during the period of the struggle for independence.

Eye Filmmuseum seen across the river IJ © Marcus Koppen

Eye Filmmuseum, © Marcus Koppen

poster Oeroeg (Hans Hylkema, BE/DE/NL 1993)

still from Oeroeg (Hans Hylkema, BE/DE/NL 1993)

still Oeroeg (Hans Hylkema, BE/DE/NL 1993)

still from Tjoet Nja' Dhien (Eros Djarot, ID 1988)

still Tjoet Nja' Dhien (Eros Djarot, ID 1988)

campaign image Revolusi! (still from Merah Putih (Red and White) (Yadi Sugandi, ID 2009))

campaign image Revolusi!

still from Hantu (Kim Kokosky Deforchaux, NL 2021)

still Hantu (Kim Kokosky Deforchaux, NL 2021)

Still End of an Empire

still Schattenberg

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Epic anti-colonial film about the long, bloody struggle against colonial Dutch repression in the Sultanate of Aceh centring on the female guerrilla Tjoet Nja' Dhien. When her husband and rebel leader Teuku Umar dies in an ambush, Dhien decides to fight the Dutch colonial army herself and assembles the countless guerrillas of Aceh under her command.

In 2006, Indonesian film critic Ade Irwansyah called this film the "peak achievement of [Indonesia's] film industry up till now." With its gripping story, true heroes and convincing villains, beautiful camera work, and the hugely popular Christine Hakim in the title role, his assessment seems right on the mark. Aceh's independence came to an end in 1871, when the Dutch placed the sultanate in northern Sumatra under colonial rule. The Acehnese, however, put up a strong resistance, which two years later led to a bloody war. In 1880, Teuku Umar, one of the main guerrilla leaders, married Tjoet Nja' Dhien, who had also joined the resistance movement. When Umar died, Dhien emerged as the new, charismatic and fearless leader, a position she held for ten years. Her actions became legendary; in 1964 she was declared a national heroine. Director Eros Djarot tells her story.

Tjoet Nja' Dhien can be seen in a fully restored version, done in 2017 by Eye Film Museum and the Indonesian Film Centre Foundation, in close collaboration with director Eros Djarot and producer Alwin Abdullah.
 Eros Djarot (1950, Indonesia) is an Indonesian songwriter, director and politician who studied at the London International Film School. Having
composed soundtracks for many films, including the successful Badai Pasti Berlalu, he made his directing debut in 1988 with the multiaward-winning Tjoet Nja' Dhien, a Caméra d'Or nominee at Cannes 1989.

Tjoet Nja' Dhien

Filmmakers Monique Verhoeckx and Sabine Groenewegen talk with cultural historian Nancy Jouwe. In their artistic process, they make use of archival materials with a colonial background to create a new narrative. On how to express the ongoing resonance of heritage and identity.

Filmmaker and visual artist Monique Verhoeckx is working on a cinematic installation using mixed media as well as an interdisciplinary project, BIAK Stories, investigating the effects of war, decolonisation and diaspora alongside themes such as identity and trauma. 

In BIAK Stories, a cinematic installation made up of three projection screens, archival footage, sound design and objects, she probes a complicated romantic relationship within the tensions surrounding the decolonisation of Netherlands New Guinea.
Sabine Groenewegen is an artist and award-winning filmmaker whose work has been shown internationally at film festivals and art centers. She will discuss her ongoing project Missing Scenes, which explores histories of women on rubber plantations in Sumatra in the early 20th century and the narrative machines which mediated the representation of those realities, including omissions in the archival remains.
Nancy Jouwe is a cultural historian and author. As a researcher, lecturer and curator she focuses on ethnicity, gender, race and misogynoir (hatred directed towards black women); Papuan heritage and identity and transcultural art projects are also covered by her research.
Dutch spoken

BIAK Stories & Missing Scenes - een nieuw narratief voor koloniale film

How did the Netherlands see the war in Indonesia? What footage was deemed suitable for the Polygoon newsreels, and what was censored? Gerda Jansen Hendriks, director of the NTR series Indonesia Roept!, shows film clips and analyses the political motivations underlying these choices.

What did Dutch cinema audiences get to see from 1946 to 1949 about the war being fought in Indonesia? What did the weekly Polygoon newsreel – at that time the only news source with moving pictures – show?

And, at least as interesting, what did the general public in the Netherlands not get to see? What films were prohibited by the censors (still working in those days)? What footage was kept out of the public eye? Was there a place for Indonesian films? Historian Gerda Jansen Hendriks answers these questions using an extensive selection of film clips and shows how the Dutch government deliberately used film as propaganda to influence public opinion.

Government films The clips are taken from films including the portmanteau films Brigade flitsen Korps Mariniers (NL 1946/47, collection of the Netherlands Institute of Military History) and Oud en Nieuw in Indonesië (NL 1947, Eye collection).

Gerda Jansen Hendriks is a director with public broadcaster with NTR’s history department; she is the originator of the popular Dutch TV show Andere Tijden. She obtained her doctorate in films made by the Dutch government about the Dutch East Indies during the period 1912-1962. Together with Hans Goedkoop, she also recently made the two-part film 'De Indische rekening'.

Oorlog in de Oost - propaganda en het Nederlandse bioscoopjournaal

exclusiveScreeningsInEye

Moderator Arnaud Kokosky Deforchaux (Tong Tong Fair, CinemAsia) talks to directors Hans Hylkema (Oeroeg, 1993), Kim Kokosky Deforchaux (Hantu, 2021) and actor Martin Schwab (Oeroeg, Hantu) about the depiction of the Indonesian struggle for liberation and the past of Indonesia.

Both films show the impact of colonial history and how the ramifications of the past resound in the present.

Revolusi! depicts the Indonesian people’s political struggle and the legacy of colonialism from multiple perspectives. Alongside the freedom films from Indonesia, Eye will also screen films by Dutch directors and artists with a critical view of history.

Revolusi!

Hantu (Kim Kokosky Deforchaux, NL 2021) & Oeroeg (Hans Hylkema, NL 1993)

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show for: 644334 2022-03-15 16:00:00

show for: 646226 2022-03-29 19:15:00

Lecture by historian Gerda Jansen Hendriks

show for: 646229 2022-03-18 16:00:00

Q&A with Hans Hylkema (Oeroeg), Kim Kokosky Deforchaux (Hantu) and Martin Schwab (Oeroeg, Hantu)

Oeroeg & Hantu

Hantu (Kim Kokosky Deforchaux, NL 2021) & Oeroeg (Hans Hylkema, NL 1993)

Moderator Arnaud Kokosky Deforchaux (Tong Tong Fair, CinemAsia) talks to directors Hans Hylkema (Oeroeg, 1993), Kim Kokosky Deforchaux (Hantu, 2021) and actor Martin Schwab (Oeroeg, Hantu) about the depiction of the Indonesian struggle for liberation and the past of Indonesia.

Programme

Hantu (Kim Kokosky Deforchaux, NL 2021, 19’, English subs)

Oeroeg (Hans Hylkema, NL 1993, 118’, English subs)

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Revolusi!