In "Reflections on Dutch Capitalism: Zero Sugar Version," Lakaaysha van Ewijk delves into how capitalism molds identity and desire, using an Italian expat's journey in the Netherlands as a lens. The film critiques the deep entanglement of consumer habits with our sense of self, showcasing the absurdities of a system where products shape identities. Through a narrative rich in symbolism, it probes the paradoxes of consumer culture versus the quest for authenticity, compelling viewers to question the impact of capitalist values on human nature and societal bonds.
The Expat
Lenor
The film weaves together the filmmaker's introspections with survivor's collective memories. Amid deciphering a diary, the filmmaker reflects on personal encounters.
1986 - The protest movement against the construction of the nuclear power plant in Brokdorf is on its last legs. Only one rural commune remains: the "Alternative Wohnkollektiv Regenbogen". For them, it could go on and on with endless consensus discussions, shearing sheep and naked communal bathing. One day, the lowland communards are joined by two city dwellers, Hanne and her son Niels. While Hanne gets used to scream therapy and raising vegetables surprisingly quickly - and even more quickly to the tantra games with commune guru Peter - Niels has less and less desire for the dogmatic commune rules. Out of defiance, he joins the violent nuclear power plant resistance, thus upsetting the tranquil chaos of the commune. The big bang, however, comes when a reactor explodes in distant Chernobyl. Exactly on the day Bobby Ewing dies, the petroleum prince from "Dallas" and series favorite of the commune.
Even though he's 35, Alex acts more like he's 13, spending his days as the world's oldest video game tester and his evenings developing the next big Xbox game. But when he gets kicked out of his apartment, he's forced to move in with his grandmother.
This 12 minute short was released as part of the Choose Your Own Adventure option on the H&K Guantanamo Bay DVD. The blurb is: "Ever wonder what would have happened if Harold & Kumar had not been sent to Guantanamo and simply made it to Amsterdam? Here's a little something director Jon Hurwitz shot guerrilla-style all over Amsterdam in 3 days."
A man who accused a catholic bishop of abusing him when he was a child dies in the Austrian city Salzburg. Everyone except his widow and the eccentrical detective Simon Brenner keeps silent and believes that the man killed himself.
Two stoners wake up after a night of partying and cannot remember where they parked their car.
During the 1980s, uptight Ted Boynton is a salesman working in the Barcelona office of a Chicago-based company. He receives an unexpected visit from his cousin Fred, a naval officer who has come to Spain on a public relations mission for a U.S. fleet. Not exactly friends in the past, Ted and Fred strike up relationships with women in the Spanish city and experience conflicts -- Ted with his employer, and Fred with the Barcelona community.
The decade of the hippies is at an end and the 80's are approaching fast. Carl and Robert are two doped out guys who lives in harmony with the world around them and let life pass by in an eternal hash high. They have been peddling hashish for a decade, hitting an all time high with this last batch: 45 Kilos of pure, high grade Nepalese Hashish. Following the delivery, the police are on their tail.
Having satisfied their urge for White Castle, Harold and Kumar jump on a plane to catch up with Harold's love interest, who's headed for the Netherlands. But the pair must change their plans when Kumar is accused of being a terrorist. Rob Corddry also stars in this wild comedy sequel that follows the hapless stoners' misadventures as they try to avoid being captured by the Department of Homeland Security.
Two out-of-work actors -- the anxious, luckless Marwood and his acerbic, alcoholic friend, Withnail -- spend their days drifting between their squalid flat, the unemployment office and the pub. When they take a holiday "by mistake" at the country house of Withnail's flamboyantly gay uncle, Monty, they encounter the unpleasant side of the English countryside: tedium, terrifying locals and torrential rain.
Memory is a ghost. Lucio, a printing press worker, takes one last walk around the machines with whom he shared everything. He remembers when his mechanisms used to move and through that mechanical movement he reflects about his own life.
Jan receives the group patch at the campfire, Herkules brews up some tea in the workshop and Sidney gets a mohawk haircut done by his father. The film shows fragments from an Oberhausen subculture in which symbols and practices of the outlaw motorbiker scene are transferred to cycling.
Trish invites her high school basketball teammates over for a night they'll never forget -- or survive -- when an unexpected guest crashes the party: an escaped psychopath with a portable power drill.
“Can I be nostalgic about something I’ve never experienced?” asks debut filmmaker Pranami Koch. She has in mind her grandmother, a person she never knew who belonged to the Koches, a people in India with their own culture and traditions. In her search for connection and identity, Pranami travels to the countryside and immerses herself in the Koch community.
Peter Jordan is 33 years old and stuck in a dead end retail job at Super Duper Computers. To make matters worse, he's managed to rack up over $35,000 worth of debt. Student Loans, credit cards, Big Screen TV. His love life is equally in debt. Just when it seems he will never break out of his rut, an old high school buddy named Frehley shows up unexpectedly. Under Frehley's influence...
Nick Hart is a struggling American artist who lives amongst the expatriate community in 1920s Paris. He spends most of his time drinking and socializing in local café's and pestering gallery owner Libby Valentin to sell his paintings. He becomes involved in a plot by wealthy art patroness Nathalie de Ville to forge three paintings. This leads to several run-ins with American rubber magnate Bertram Stone, who happens to be married to Hart's ex-wife Rachel.
From an ominous Lecturer, a small 1930s middle American community learns of the Harper Affair, in which young Jimmy Harper finds his life of promise turn into a life of debauchery and murder thanks to the new drug menace marijuana. Along the way, he receives help from his girlfriend Mary and Jesus Himself, but always finds himself in the arms of the Reefer Man and the rest of the denizens of the Reefer Den.