Women Make Waves International Film Festival

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    Antonia's Line

    Marleen Gorris 1995 Holland Fiction color 104min Dutch 35mm
    A faintly magical, life-affirming trip through the generations of an unusual family, Antonia’s Line strikes a solid blow for female solidarity. On a perfectly ordinary day, Antonia (Willeke van Ammelrooy) wakes as usual and decides that today she will die. Although she is not ill, and despite being in her eighties, being a clear-minded woman she knows instinctively when it is time to go.

    With this decided, Antonia's thoughts drift back forty years, to a post-WWII Europe. She had just returned to her birthplace, after a 20-year absence, with her daughter Danielle (Els Dottermans), just as her aging and deranged mother was just about to pass away. Afterward, mother and daughter took over their inherited farm.

    While they are geographically part of the village, Antonia's conscious decision not to have any men around sets them apart from the so-called norm. In fact the village is awash with unusual characters, from Crooked Finger (Mil Seghers), a misanthropic recluse, to Mad Madonna (Catherine ten Bruggencate), a Catholic lady who howls mournfully at the full moon. Downstairs, The Protestant (Paul Kooij) bangs on the ceiling in annoyance, to mask the love that he really feels for Antonia (which can never be fulfilled due to their religious differences).

    Director

    Marleen Gorris

    One of the Netherlands's best-known filmmakers and an important, often provocative voice in world cinema, writer and director Marleen Gorris is renowned- and, in some circles, reviled- for making unapologetically feminist films that assert the rights of women as they question the patriarchy that often represses them. Gorris earned particular international recognition for Antonia's Line, a portrait of several generations of Dutch women that won a 1995 Academy Award for Best Foreign Film. Born in Holland's Limburg region in 1948, Gorris studied drama at home and abroad. She began working as a filmmaker with almost no previous experience in the cinema and made an auspicious writing and directorial debut in 1982 with De Stilte Rond (A Question of Silence).

    Marleen Gorris

    2003 Caroline

    2000 The Luzhin Defence

    1997 Mrs. Dalloway

    1995 Antonia's Line

    1990 The Last Lsland

    1984 Broken Mirrors

    1982 A Question of Silence

    Director: Marleen Gorris

    Screenplay: Marleen Gorris

    Cinematographer: Willy Stassen

    Editor: Wim Louwrier, Michiel Reichwein

    Sound: Dirk Bombey

    Music: Ilona Sekacz

    Cast: Willeke van Ammelrooy, Matgo Dames, Jan Dottermans, Marina De Graaf, Victor Low, Mil Seghers, Jan Steen

    Language: Dutch

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