Willem van der Zanden
Directing
Biography
Willem van der Zanden was born in the city of Breda, the Netherlands on the 5th of July 1995. After attending primary school in the small town of Bavel and spending 7 years at the Stedelijk Gymnasium in Breda, he started studying at the AKV St. Joost in Breda where he slowly shaped his craft. His work is very observing and often focuses on his own life or fragments of it. He personally believes his film Qu'est-ce Que C'est? to be one of the most valuable films he has made so far as it helped him discover a big part of his style. His latest film, the graduation project A Little Testament, is a close and hyper-personal examination of his struggle with depression as well as a universally applicable view on the difficulties and anxieties of becoming an adult.
Known For
A short film recounting the travels of a lonely astronaut confronted by the unknown. Unfolding as a mystery, it becomes a carefully subtle, autobiographical examination of the feeling of loneliness and the existential issue of not understanding life on earth and ones place among it.
The Astronaut
A short documentary concerning a group of friends who get together, eat shawarma and drink beer. They talk utter nonsense at times, yet they couldn't be happier.
A Bunch of Melons Eating Shawarma
A man steadily bashes through the snow. He disappears and the trees, covered in white, shift and show a beautiful array of hidden colors. A poetic, meditative short film about letting go of the past and embracing the unknown future.
Midwinter Hue
A free-flowing, poetic short film filled with expressionist imagery, old photos and abstract moments, led by a voice-over in which the director tells us personal memories of his youth and his recent life in the hopes of sketching a clear image of the complex struggle of growing from an innocent child to a weary adult.
A Little Testament
A poetic, semi-autobiographical short film of the sun setting over a village, shot from behind the curtains of a small, dimly lit room.
How I See Sunsets
A semi-autobiographical short about a young man musing about the nostalgic joy of being a careless child.
Longing
An experimental docu-fiction short from hours of collected material shot by the director. Different scenes, from drunk parties with friends to shots of the Dutch landscape during a train ride, are cut together to see if a narrative story can be constructed from nothing but randomly shot footage.
Qu'est-ce que c'est?
An experimental journey through a year in the life of the director, using his always playing playlist to cross the boundaries of fiction and documentary. Through scenes of both comedy and tragedy, realistic documentary footage and experimental sequences of the director's environment and daily life we get a sometimes estranging image of a young man and also an intriguing insight in his mindset and how this translates to the imagery on screen.
PLEH
Set to be a fictitious film in the vein of A Little Testament where actors are not or rarely seen and only heard through voice-over, recounting the story of the young girl Sesheia who lives on a post-apocalyptic earth and has to go on a perilous journey whilst learning of the world's past and present.
Sesheia
An ambient representation of depression with a slowly fading score building towards an uncertain climax.
Gloom
A short, poetic documentary of an old woman and the loneliness that surrounds her after her husband was sent to a nursing home.
Joanne & Jacob
When the catering of a film set has canceled, one of the runners is burdened with the task of fixing lunch against impossible odds.
The Caterer
A 90-second short showing a fairytale-like story of an abandoned art academy and the students who once resided there.
In the Back of the Garden
A misty midnight. Music plays in one house, in the other, a man brushes his teeth. More and more sounds are heard yet the darkness hardly reveals where it's all coming from. It's midnight. Isn't anybody asleep?
Midnight Screening
No description available.