Maarten van der Ven

To a Land Unknown

The stakes couldn't be higher for displaced Palestinian refugees Chatila and Reda in this knife-edge drama. The cousins are saving to pay for fake passports to get out of Athens, but when Reda loses their hard-earned cash to his drug addiction, Chatila hatches an extreme plan to pose as smugglers in an attempt to get them out of their desperate situation before it is too late.

Idyllic

Three generations of one Dutch family, along with the neighbors they encounter, question their lives — from their relationships and the value of their existence to their concerns for the future.

Kiddo

Lying on a bunk bed in a children's home, eleven-year-old Lu talks with dreamy eyes about her mother, Karina, who claims to be a famous Hollywood actress who smells of oranges, talks to the stars and does her own stunts.

Porcelain

The lives of Anna, Paul and their little son Thomas seem perfect from the outside. Paul has a well-paid job, Anna has a home studio where she works with porcelain and Thomas is an angelic child. However, when Thomas bites one of his friends at school, the cracks of a context that is anything but perfect begin to surface.

Re \ Entry

'What happened? Where am I?' The man who wakes up alone in the woods has many questions. Is he dead and in the hereafter? The voice of God soberly answers his questions: Yep, that’s right. Traffic accident. But it’s not that bad, because everyone eventually dies. All the man’s questions, also about the meaning of life, are answered. In an equally entertaining and stimulating dialogue in English, the film evokes a comprehensive image of the universe and man’s place in it.

My Foolish Heart

In 1988 Amsterdam, a Dutch police detective finds himself on a bittersweet journey of discovery as he investigates the mysterious demise of jazz icon Chet Baker, found dead on the street below his hotel room in the city center.

Waterboys

Both newly single, a Dutch crime author and his cellist son attempt to rekindle their feeble bond as the latter joins the former on a publicity trip to Scotland.

Copyrette

A young woman’s naked body lies inertly on a kitchen floor. With the paint all flaked off and the trash in the garden, her house looks deserted at first glance. The atmosphere is ominous. In a nearby wood, a man calls his beautiful white, almost translucent dog. The man and woman’s paths cross at a copy shop, where the introverted woman’s peculiar physical obsession manifests itself.

The Datcha

Jordy is an eleven year old boy who's family has not been functioning after his homesick mother went back to her home-country Russia. Jordy devises a master plan to get her back. He builds a Russian house, a datcha, in the backyard of their house. He is convinced this will make his mother feel at home again. Eventually his mother doesn't come back, but Jordy's actions do get his family back on track.

Arash

The refugee Matthew wait in the outfit centre schiphol East for its flight to Sudan. If that of but, Arash, a despair action commits, Matthew get suddenly the chance of escaping

Making of Oorlogswinter

A behind the scenes look at the production of Martin Koolhoven's film, Oorlogswinter.