Financed with Dutch money and shot on location in The Netherlands and Latvia, De nieuwe moeder tells the story of how a desperate father kidnaps his mute son from a Riga hospital in order to find another mother for him in the affluent West. Marie, his Dutch pen-pal from his youth, is the woman to whom he turns in order that the child's happiness may be secured and for him to talk again.
The film is the debut feature of Paula van der Oest, one of The Netherland's most talented young filmmakers. Two of her films, Coma (1994) and Achilles and the Zebra Crossing (1995) won the Dutch Film Festival Golden Calf for the best TV film.
'The ideal films are those which hold a cinematographic interest and have a very solid content,' says producer René Scholten. 'In every country you have producers like me who demand very high quality and if everything fuses well then you may have a success, critically and with the audiences.'
Scholten recognises that an antipathy towards films from The Netherlands exists within the domestic audience: that is until they achieve success abroad, as in the case of the Dutch foreign-language Oscar-winner Antonia. This latter example inspires the producer to assess positively his film's critical and domestic potential. 'I think that a film like De nieuwe moeder can give the [Dutch] people the confidence to go to see a home-grown film before a more well-known US release.' Nicholas Cunningham
Prod co: Studio Nieuwe Gronden, KRO Television
Prod: René Scholten
Dir: Paula van der Oest
Scr: Paula van der Oest, Stan Lapinski
Ph: Brigit Hillenius
Music: Fons Merkies
Ed: Menno Boerema
Cast: Janis Reinis, Arys Adamsons, Geert de Jong, Evert de Jager, Hannah van Lunteren
Running time: 95 mins
Int sales: Studio Nieuwe Gronden
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