Bert Haanstra is one of my all-time favorite directors, famed for his documentaries and short films but his four fiction features have been completely disregarded. It's a shame they never traveled far outside of Holland.
I saw "Dr. Pulder Sows Poppies" at the Toronto Film Festival in 1977 and loved it, but it's taken me another 47 years to see his next (and last) feature "Eek Pak Slaag", available on a Dutch DVD boxed set devoted to him.
The title translates as "A Sound Thrashing", hardly suitable as a title so it is known as "Mr. Slotter's Jubilee" (I guess title echoes of the Tati classic "Mr. Hulot's Holiday"?).
Written by Anton Koolhaas from his own novel, it's a rather amazing study of human nature, loaded with colorful characters and expertly directed by Haanstra with an ensemble of talented, stage-trained actors. He observes their foibles, defects and underlying big hearts in a fashion that sticks with you. Nothing flashy or spectacular, but as an accompanying, brief "Making of" short film demonstrates, very creatively shot.
Overall, Koolhaas is satirizing the types of personalities who get ahead in a corporate setting, even though this setting is decidedly not high-tech or high-pressure, but instead a family business manufacturing baby carriages. Stage great Peter Steenbergen plays Slieps, the founder of the namesake company, who is now thought to be senile, but still has some of his wits about him.
Event is the 25th anniversary of his protege Kees Brusse (underplaying throughout) running the business. He's an aloof boss nobody really likes, so a bunch of employees led by Jeroen Krabbe (the only cast member to make it big internationally when Dutch cinema caught on around this time) decide to honor his jubilee celebration with an underhanded, mean-spirited prank. They had "punked" him (to use the latter-day Ashton Kutcher term) with a small herd of sheep ushered into his office by a guy styled as Abraham from the Bible four years before on Slotter's 50th birthday, so why not embarrass the tight-ass guy again?
This plan backfires, and the latter reels of the movie are highly original, as we witness a combination of pathos, black humor, and thought-provoking soul-searching by the two main protagonists Slotter and Slieps. I found it tremendously moving, and casting of even the smallest roles is spot on.
Haanstra (and his prime collaborator here Anton Koolhaas) is a humanist, and his work is refreshing as an antidote to today's cynical approach.
