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THE APOLOGIST is a cinematic and emotional journey that moves between intimate personal reflection, performance and ritual, exploring the transformative power of apologies. &nbsp;&nbsp;Connecting continents, voices and events that are seemingly unrelated, the film asks how we live with the scars of shared violence. We search for reparation in different ways: through theatre, political process, song, or the careful work of stitching memory so it is not lost.&nbsp;&nbsp;Blending the personal and the collective, THE APOLOGIST traces the fragile spaces between memory, pain, and reconciliation. Brutal and gentle, the film flows like a river across past and present, asking what it means not only to seek forgiveness, but to receive it.

Every public apology has the power to reshape lives — not just for the wrongdoer and the victim, but for society as a whole, as the past itself is redrawn.

Kristof had a career creating moving images for performing arts and eventually moved to filmmaking. He is an alumnus from the National Film and Television School (UK), doing Documentary Direction.&nbsp;&nbsp;ELEPHANT'S DREAM (2014), his first feature film, screened at more than 40 festivals worldwide and featured on BBC World Service, CBS’s The Current a.o. and received various awards such as Special Mention in the One World Media Awards UK and was awarded at Michael Moore's Traverse City FF and shown on Netflix.&nbsp;&nbsp;His 2nd feature documentary, MOTHER (2019), worldpremiered at Sheffield Doc/Fest and shown a.o. at IFF Rotterdam, DOC NYC, and on Al Jazeera English. It won several awards and honorable mentions during its festival tour and wide acclaim in national and international media.&nbsp;&nbsp;He regularly teaches Documentary Direction and gives workshops on documentary research and storytelling.&nbsp;&nbsp;Kristof is member of European Film Academy, Union of Directors (Belgium), deAuteurs and a alumnus of the EURODOC Documentary Producers' program and Jihlava's Emerging Producers 2019.

Kristof

Author's Documentaries

Human Interest & Society

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English

The Apologist

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Soldiers train for urban combat in a fictional war in the largest military training city in Europe. Recruits examine grenades from the Second World War in an ammunition museum. In a lecture, a colonel speaks to district administrators about the Zeitenwende. Visitors on a company outing try out weapons and climb into tanks. Soldiers dig a trench. Members of the press question a general about the war in Ukraine. A temporary employment agency sends extras who play refugees in a military exercise.&nbsp;The past, present and the future of war in Germany and Europe collide at the Altmark military training area in Saxony-Anhalt. The documentary film SCENARIO tells this story in fragmentary scenes. &nbsp;&nbsp;The Altmark training area is located in the Colbitz-Letzlingen Heath, the largest uninhabited area in Germany. It is visible to the naked eye from space. The site is 28 kilometers long and covers an area of around 23,000 hectares. Today it is home to the Army Combat Training Centre, the central facility for operational training of German soldiers. But the Altmark training area also has a history: beginning in 1936, the Wehrmacht tested artillery weapons there and later heavy weapons such as the railway gun Dora at the “Hillersleben Army Testing Facility.” Two villages located in the area were forcibly evacuated and demolished for this purpose. From 1945 to 1994, the Soviet Army used the site and at times stationed up to 20,000 soldiers at its westernmost training ground. In 1994, the German Bundeswehr took over the training area and began clearing the ammunition that had accumulated there during nearly 70 years of military exercises. Even today, 30 employees search daily with probes and spades for unexploded bombs, grenades, and ammunition debris in the soil of the site. &nbsp;&nbsp;The training area is also home to the most modern military training city in Europe, called “Schnöggersburg.” The city has 550 buildings. Fifteen high-rise buildings, supermarkets, a 16-kilometer motorway, a chemical plant, an old town district, an industrial zone, a subway, a sports stadium, an airport, and even a 22-meter-wide river with five bridges were built for more than 100 million euros. A captain says: “In the past, it was difficult to justify why we spent so much money on this military model city. Today, as terrible as it is, that’s no longer a problem.” The training city is architecturally designed so that it could be anywhere in the world, because no one knows where German and NATO soldiers might be deployed in the future. The aim is to be prepared for all possible scenarios. Throughout the year, battalions from across Germany and from other NATO countries come to the Combat Training Centre. They are given a fictional war scenario and then train in the field and in the training city, using laser weapons, sensors, and blank ammunition. &nbsp;&nbsp;SCENARIO was filmed at the Altmark training area during the year 2024. In observational, fragmentary scenes, the film portrays everyday life on a German military training ground in a time of transformation and uncertainty.

SCENARIO shows how war is rehearsed in the largest military mock city in Europe, right in the heart of Germany. 

Marie Wilke studied directing, editing and cinematography at the School for Documentary and Television in Bolzano, Italy, and at the University of the Arts (UdK), Berlin, with Harun Farocki and Heinz Emigholz.&nbsp;From 2004 until 2014 she worked as an academic assistant in the directing department of the Film University Babelsberg Konrad Wolf. From 2021 to 2022 she was also the artistic director of the Berlin film school DFFB.&nbsp;&nbsp;Her feature-length documentary CIVIL SERVANTS was released in theatres in July 2015, her feature-length documentary AGGREGATE premiered at the Berlinale in 2018. Among other films she also made a six-part documentary series HÖLLENTAL for ZDF Das Kleine Fernsehspiel in 2021. She works as a writer, director and teacher and lives in Berlin.

Marie

Architecture & Design

Current Affairs & Politics

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Szenario

Scenario

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Elderly brothers René and Rob can’t do with or without each other. René lives the life of a recluse, in a house that is overflowing with stuff. When things threaten to get out of hand, his younger brother Rob intervenes.&nbsp;&nbsp;Filmmaker Tom Fassaert, Rob’s son, documents these weekly visits and recognizes a familiar dynamic. Rob, a retired psychologist, slips into the role of counsellor; René, a longtime psychiatric patient, becomes his client. Their underlying irritation is genuine, but so is their affection.&nbsp;&nbsp;As Rob and René repeat the same ritual every week, Tom begins to sense that something must be behind it. Something old and unspoken. In the family archives, he discovers a mystery: when the brothers were children, their father disappeared without a trace. No goodbye, no explanation, just an absence that has influenced three generations.&nbsp;&nbsp;Tom has explored his family history before. In A FAMILY AFFAIR (2015), he examined the legacy of an emotionally elusive mother. In Between Brothers, he turns to his father and uncle. He takes them on a road trip without a clear destination, in search of traces of a man who deliberately left none behind. En route, it becomes clear that the man who disappeared has left more than just questions. He has left a blueprint for how men in this family withdraw and retreat, each in their own way.

Two elderly brothers make a final attempt to clear up the wreckage of their past. What begins as a tragicomic film about their unusual dynamic turns into a moving search for their unknown roots.

Filmmaker Tom Fassaert (1979) spent his childhood in both The Netherlands and South Africa. These contrasting environments have undoubtably shaped the way he looks at the world. But his love of film stems from his father’s passion for home movies.&nbsp;&nbsp;Common thread in his films is intimacy between himself and his subject. Through this intimacy, he investigates themes like bonding, intergenerational trauma and the desire for autonomy. Gently, he observes both the tragedy and the absurd wrapped inside a recalcitrant reality.&nbsp;&nbsp;His debut film, AN ANGEL IN DOEL, premiered at the Berlin Film Festival, where it received world-wide attention. This second, A FAMILY AFFAIR, opened IDFA 2015. It won the Special Jury Award and was nominated for a European Film Award. Variety mentioned Fassaert as ‘One of the ten documentary makers to watch’.

Generation

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Tussen broers

English, Dutch

Between Brothers

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After the 2001 EU summit in Göteborg was marred by violent clashes between police and demonstrators, a government inquiry concluded that the Swedish police needed a deeper understanding of politically active groups. The Dialogue Police was created, with a team in Stockholm as the only unit in the country working full-time in this role.&nbsp; In 2022, amid demonstrations, Quran burnings, and climate actions, filmmaker Susanna Edwards followed the officers on their mission to safeguard everyone’s right to freedom of speech. In a polarized society, the team is united by humor and a shared calling: defending democracy with dialogue as their weapon.

In 2022, amid demonstrations, Quran burnings, and climate actions, filmmaker Susanna Edwards follows THE DIALOGUE POLICE on their mission to safeguard everyone’s right to freedom of speech.

Susanna Edwards works in both narrative and documentary filmmaking. In 1996, she won the Swedish Guldbagge Award for SUNSHADOW, a documentary about the bullfighter Cristina Sánchez. The film was sold to 35 countries and won numerous international awards. In 2000, she received a Guldbagge nomination for her film RESPECT!, which follows four teenage girls from Farsta, on the outskirts of Stockholm.&nbsp;Her narrative feature debut, KEILLERS PARK (2006), is a love story with a tragic outcome. The film was distributed internationally, including in the U.S. In 2013, her film DANCE MY HEART OUT, shot in Cuba, won the Dagmar and Václav Havel Foundation's VIZE 97 Award, a prestigious human rights prize.&nbsp;&nbsp;Her documentary GOLDEN GIRL, about Swedish WBC World Champion boxer Frida Wallberg, was nominated for a Guldbagge Award for Best Sound Design in 2017. That same year, she completed the documentary CAPTURING THE DIVINE, about Anglo-Egyptian singer Natacha Atlas.&nbsp;&nbsp;With THE DIALOGUE POLICE, Susanna takes the next step in her career, both producing and directing — supported by co-producers and executive producers who are leading figures in the industry.

Susanna

Human Rights

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As published by Geoffrey Macnab in <a href="https://www.screendaily.com/news/film-harbour-boards-the-dialogue-police-following-gothenburg-premiere-exclusive/5201537.article">Screen Daily</a>:&nbsp;"Amsterdam-based sales outfit Film Harbour has snapped up international rights to documentary <a href="filmharbour.com/films/the-dialogue-police">THE DIALOGUE POLICE</a> by Swedish filmmaker Susanna Edwards following its premiere last week in Gothenburg’s Nordic Documentary Competition.&nbsp;The documentary sees Edwards follow a specialised unit of police officers - the Dialogue Police - on their mission to safeguard the right to freedom of speech amid demonstrations, Quran burnings and climate actions in Sweden in 2022. The team, established after the Gothenburg riots of 2021, favours dialogue over force.Edwards previous credits include Sunshadow and Capturing The Divine. THE DIALOGUE POLICE will have its international premiere in March in CPH:DOX’s Human Rights Competition.&nbsp;THE DIALOGUE POLICE is directed and produced by Edwards for Sweden’s Siren Film. TriArt Film is handling Swedish distribution. Film Harbour was launched last year by the former CEO of Deckert Distribution, Liselot Verbrugge. Its slate includes THE PROPAGANDIST by Luuk Bouwman, which premiered in IDFA, PURE UNKNOWN by Mattia Colombo and Valentina Cicogna, and Sundance Special Jury Award winner AGAINST THE TIDE by Sarvnik Kaur."

Celebrating the World Premiere of THE DIALOGUE POLICE

Dialogpolisen

The Dialogue Police

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Using previously unpublished interviews, family films and propaganda films, THE PROPAGANDIST tells the story of the rise and fall of Dutch filmmaker Jan Teunissen (1898-1975). As head of the Department of Film of the Dutch Nazi Party and SS, he became the most powerful man in the Dutch film industry during World War II.&nbsp;Teunissen, nicknamed the ‘Film King’ and the ‘Dutch Leni Riefenstahl’ was a well-known filmmaker before the war. What drove him to become part of the Nazi regime?&nbsp;&nbsp;THE PROPAGANDIST questions the boundaries between documentary and propaganda and the role of propagandists –&nbsp; how they spread images, narratives, misinformation and ideology. A documentary about boundless ambition and the manipulative power of film.

Through family films, propaganda footage, and audio interviews, this documentary delves into the life of Jan Teunissen (1898-1975), head of the Dutch Nazi Party's Film Department during World War II. 

Luuk Bouwman has made several feature-length documentaries, including GERLACH, THE LAST FARMER (2023, IDFA Best Dutch Film Award) with Aliona van der Horst, IT IS TRUE BUT NOT HERE (2017) about artist and cult musician Dick Verdult and ALL AGAINST ALL (2019) about the rise of fascism in the Netherlands, which premiered at IDFA and for which he was awarded the IDFA Stipend 2023. His documentaries are driven by extensive research and long-term engagement with his subjects, revealing processes and mechanisms.&nbsp;

Luuk

Art & Culture

History

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The IDFA Award for Best Dutch Film 2024 goes to <a href="https://filmharbour.com/directors/luuk-bouwman">Luuk Bouwman</a> for <a href="https://filmharbour.com/films/the-propagandist">THE PROPAGANDIST</a>. From the jury statement:&nbsp; “How is it even possible, you wonder, with everything that has been written, filmed, or expressed in any other form, related to the WWII era in the Netherlands, this specific story is only just now fully being exposed to a bigger audience? This documentary shows us a part of history; one that has been deliberately forgotten and could only become visible, and therefore examined, interpreted, and remembered, because image and sound were preserved. For the riveting examination of the horrifying pages of Dutch history, as well as the history of WWII-era European cinema, and for the immense research, documentation, and the outstanding use of archival material, the jury would like to bestow the 2024 IDFA Award for the Best Dutch Film to Luuk Bouwman’s documentary THE PROPAGANDIST."

THE PROPAGANDIST wins IDFA Award for Best Dutch Film

De propagandist

The Propagandist

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Why do so many men struggle to show their feelings?&nbsp;&nbsp;Part therapy, part road trip, BAFTA award winning filmmaker Duncan Cowles asks men how they open up in order to directly address his own difficulties in being intimate and open with his loved ones.&nbsp;With profound honesty and deadpan wit, SILENT MEN intertwines awkward conversations and the filmmaking process, asking what makes men tick, and more importantly, how to come to terms with all aspects of health, both physical and mental.&nbsp;Exploring aspects of masculinity that all too often are little discussed, this film opens the door for other ways of being, communicating and healing, as well as attempting to define masculinity.

Part therapy, part road trip, Duncan Cowles asks men how they show their emotions, to help him confront his own struggles with opening up to loved ones.

Duncan Cowles is a BAFTA Scotland Award winning documentary filmmaker whose films are often known for their heart and humour.&nbsp;He has directed a number of short films over the years such as DIRECTED BY TWEEDIE, ISABELLA and TAKING STOCK. His shorts have screened at A-list festivals such as BFI London Film Festival, and won a selection of awards at festivals such as Glasgow Short Film Festival, Open City Documentary Festival, BFI Future Film Festival, Hamburg Short Film Festival and The Smalls.&nbsp;His first feature documentary SILENT MEN, supported by Screen Scotland &amp; The Whickers, explores the theme of men's mental health and premiered at Sheffield Doc/Fest in 2024 and was awarded a Special Mention in the International First Features Competition.&nbsp;He's won a Royal Television Society Award and been nominated three times for Best UK short film at the London Critics Circle Awards. His shorts have been regularly featured on platforms such as Short of the Week, Vimeo Staff Picks, BFI Player, It’s Nice That and BBCiPlayer.&nbsp;Duncan has been commissioned to write and direct documentaries for Channel 4, STV, BBC Scotland, BBC Radio 4, TED, Adobe and more. In 2020 Duncan was commissioned to make x6 30minute episodes of his own new documentary TV series SCARY ADULT THINGS which looks at the struggles of the millennial generation for BBC Scotland and BBCiplayer which aired in March 2021.

Duncan

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Silent Men: The Awkward Art of Expressing Emotion

Silent Men

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As the long-awaited COVID-19 vaccine brings a glimmer of hope, through candid conversations with people waiting in line for vaccination, this globally relatable film reveals the disorientation and skepticism that permeate our collective experience.&nbsp;&nbsp;Serving as collective therapy for the post-COVID era, this humorous and humane snapshot of a unique moment in time uncovers the threads of resilience and connection that bind us, reminding us of our common humanity in the face of unprecedented challenges.

This humorous and humane snapshot of a unique moment in time uncovers the threads of resilience and connection that bind us, reminding us of our common humanity in the face of unprecedented challenges.

Goran Dević studied law, archaeology and film art at Academy of Dramatic Art, University of Zagreb, Croatia currently teaches at the Documentary Film graduate studies there. His documentaries and fiction films have won awards in Pula, Cottbus, Prizren, Prague, Sarajevo, Oberhausen, Leipzig, Motovun, and Zagreb. His feature film debut, THE BLACKS, co-directed and co-written with Zvonimir Jurić, was critically acclaimed.&nbsp; Retrospectives of his documentaries were featured at Arsenal Berlin, MAXXI Roma, Crossing Europe Filmfestival Linz, Beldocs, and Zagreb.&nbsp; He co-founded the production company Petnaesta umjetnost.&nbsp;

Goran

Science & Technology

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Paviljon 6

Pavilion 6

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WHERE DRAGONS LIVE is an extra-ordinary, feature length documentary that takes us through the looking glass into a lost world where upper-class gentlemen once embarked on world tours to collect antiquities as a right of passage, and their children read story books in Latin. Artist Harriet Impey was one of those children. For Harriet and her three older brothers, growing up ‘among dragons’ at Cumnor Place was a life of enchanted gardens, Arthurian legends and things that go bump in the night. Theirs was a rarified, story-book childhood that stoked their wildest imagination and greatest fears in equal measure. Now adults, where they once played make believe and slayed dragons, the siblings must come together to sort and clear out the family estate ready for sale, and come to terms with an unorthodox, and at times traumatic upbringing.&nbsp;Like a museum of the Impey childrens’ childhood, everything at Cumnor Place is preserved eerily in time like their father’s own bizarre bottled reptiles that still line the shelves. Even the fire-breathing dragons at the center of the family mythology now take their place among the dusty artifacts and curiosities that spill out from behind cupboard doors and dusty chests like buried treasure. Stepping back inside Cumnor Place, Harriet says, is like stepping into the past. “The house has a strange effect on all of us.”&nbsp;As they unpack the Pandora’s Box of family life at Cumnor Place, the darker side of their childhood begins to surface too. Each of the siblings is faced with difficult choices about which artifacts to keep and which to throw away - just as they must grapple with their own conflicting memories and wounds - and as all grown ups must eventually do, learn to see their parents through new eyes - not as monsters or heroes, but as mere mortals.&nbsp;WHERE DRAGONS LIVE is an intimate and enchanting portrait of childhood fears, imagination and the enduring power of the family myths and artifacts that shape our lives.

An intimate and enchanting portrait of 
Childhood fears, imagination and the enduring power of the stories and objects that shape our lives.

Suzanne Raes has been working as an independent filmmaker for more than 20 years. Her early films a.o. THE HOUSES OF HRISTINA (2007), THE RAINBOW WARRIORS OF WAIHEKE ISLAND (2009), and THE SUCCESSOR OF KAKIEMON (2012) premiered at IDFA and won several awards at international film festivals. Her film COME CLOSER about Boudewijn de Groot received the IDFA Music Audience Award in 2015.&nbsp;For her film about the Rotterdam social service, QUID PRO QUO (2015) Raes won a Golden Calf, the most important film award in the Netherlands. More recent the co-production GANZ; HOW I LOST MY BEETLE had a successful theatrical release and has been broadcasted in the Netherlands, Germany and Switzerland. In 2023 her latest film CLOSE TO VERMEER ran for an Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature, with successful cinema releases in a.o. the Netherlands, USA and Germany. The film was nominated for a Golden Calf and won the Special Jury Prize at Guangzhou International Documentary Film Festival.&nbsp;

Suzanne 

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Waar draken wonen

Where Dragons Live

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Svitlana (52), the film's director and protagonist, grew up in Mariupol during the Soviet era, when all individuality was suppressed. Later, even living in Kiev in independent Ukraine, she was unable to find a clear self-identity, which influenced the fact that Svitlana's daughter Alexandra (28) grew up without an inner core and was therefore vulnerable to any propaganda.&nbsp;There are four generations of women in Svitlana's family, and each generation grew up under different political realities. Svitlana's mother, Valentina (76), has a more Ukrainian identity than Svitlana's daughter, who has a pro-Russian orientation. Time will tell who Sveta's granddaughter, Stephanie (2), will become.The family gathers in Kiev to celebrate little Stefania's birthday 10 days before the full-scale invasion. Valentina arrives in Kiev from Mariupol, destined never to return.&nbsp;The war destroys the family's life, its past and its future. The house where Valentina lived and where Svitlana and Alexandra grew up is destroyed, and in occupied Mariupol time begins to go back to the USSR.Alexandra and her daughter Stefania leave for the UK. Despite the war Alexandra continues to be in the Russian information field. Alexandra is comforted by the Russian language, as it is the only thing she has left from the past. Svitlana stays with Valentina in Kiev, where the fragile peaceful picture can be destroyed at any moment by the arrival of a Russian missile. With the onset of cold weather, power, heat, and communication blackouts begin. On dark winter evenings, Svitlana talks to Valia about the past. Images of life in a totalitarian society that was imbued with violence against the individual resurface before Svitlana.In London, Alexandra experiences a severe existential crisis, she feels lost, like a nobody. She starts visiting a psychologist to work through her resentment towards Svitlana. To support her, Valentina decides to leave Ukraine and join her granddaughter in the UK. Svitlana stays in Kiev, which is preparing for another dark and cold winter.

Together and one-by-one at the same time, four generations of Ukrainian women from one family embark on an emotional journey shaped by their newfound memories and family history.

Born in Mariupol in 1970, she worked for over 25 years for the leading television channels in Ukraine. In 2014, she opened a new chapter in her life by leaving television and immersing herself in screenwriting and filmmaking.&nbsp;Her first documentary works were short pieces for the INVISIBLE BATTALION anthology film in collaboration with the directors Alina Gorlova and Iryna Tsilyk. A BIT OF A STRANGER is her debut feature-length documentary and is based on her personal story.

Svitlana

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Трішки чужа

A Bit of a Stranger

As a world sales company, Film Harbour distributes creative documentaries from around the globe for which we see a potential on the international market. 

The films in our catalog are very diverse in style and content, but they all have one thing in common: we are convinced of their high artistic quality and their strong relevance, and we want to introduce these outstanding documentaries to a wide international audience. 

Our main goal is to make the connection between a film and its viewers, both via the big and the small screen. 

Our films