Description

The Northerners 1992
De noorderlingen (original title)
1h 48min | Comedy, Drama | 17 April 1992 (Netherlands)
Storyline:A surreal black comedy set in a decrepit 1960’s housing development. When his mother is drawn into sainthood and the resulting frustrations of his father become too difficult to manage, Thomas, a young boy, becomes obsessed with events on the broadcast news. The liberation of the Belgian Congo is taking place and Thomas becomes Lumumba, one of the contenders as the Congo’s new leader. He is encouraged in this escapism by Plagge, the postman who reads all the mail and knows all of the bizzarre and intimate secrets of the eccentric inhabitants of the estate.User review:Go back to Holland in the suxties at where we are in a small part of some village and where we follow the lives of some inhabitants. They are all normal people with very strange behaviours…a postman who opens and reads the letters he has to deliver, a butcher who is longing for sex that can’t be given by his overcatholic wife (and their son who is only interested in the politics from Belgian Congo), a woodwatcher who thinks he can make the world a better place to watch the woods in a machoway but fails to please his woman in bed, a schoolteacher who seems to be bored by everything he does…and little by little we see that all these lives are related whether they want it or not, they all wanna go their own way but are stopped by the ruling hiphophrisy from the streets they’re living in. “De Noorderlingen” is a quite interesting movie that has great moments but sometimes looses itself into surrealism in a Bunuelway that spoils a bit the movie (the son who thinks he’s a prime minister from Congo for instance) but all by all I liked this black comedy. Belgian viewers will be longing to see a very beautiful (and young) Veerle Dobbelaere starring here!
Director: Alex van Warmerdam
Writers: Alex van Warmerdam (screenplay), Aat Ceelen (in cooperation with)
Stars: Jack Wouterse, Annet Malherbe, Rudolf Lucieer
Country: Netherlands
Language: Dutch
Release Date: 17 April 1992 (Netherlands)
Also Known As: The Northerners
Filming Locations: First Floor Film Factory, Almere, Flevoland, Netherlands
IMDB Profile tt0105019

The Northerners (1992)

1992-04-17

7.3

Director: Alex van Warmerdam

Writers: Alex van Warmerdam, Aat Ceelen

Stars: Jack Wouterse, Annet Malherbe, Rudolf Lucieer

Summary: During the summer of 1960, the idiosyncratic residents of a one-street Dutch suburb collide in intertwining stories of desire and frustration.

Also known as: De noorderlingen on DVD