This month marks exactly 20 years since the film Shouf shouf habibi! was released in the cinema and became the most visited Dutch film of 2004. This multicultural comedy caused a shift within the Dutch film climate that inspired many similar films. “Film in the Netherlands was simply stark white.”
Now The Tattas and Bon Bini films dominate the cinema box office, multicultural comedy is back with a vengeance.
It was allowed last week The Tattas 2 was the first film of the year to receive the Platinum Film for the 400,000 visitors who have seen the film so far. Last year, part 1 performed the same, meaning that more than a million people have now seen both Tatta’s films in the cinema.
This is not an isolated phenomenon, as director Martin Koolhoven knows, who partly started the trend with his film The schnitzel paradise (2005): “I’ve always found it strange that multicultural comedy has been absent for a while. We exposed something at the time that had a large audience. It’s true that there were also some less successful films released back then, like Pizza mafia and Gangster boys , but that doesn’t mean the audience has had enough of it. That may also have had to do with the quality of those films.”
Dream
For Tatta’s director Jamel Aattache, success is a dream come true: “I remember well that ‘Shouf’ and The schnitzel paradise came out and I immediately thought: shit, I would have liked to direct that too. I didn’t have the timing and luck then, but luckily I do now!”
Aattache, of Dutch-Algerian descent, grew up in a deprived neighborhood in Rotterdam and had many friends from diverse backgrounds: “We watched Dutch films, but never saw that multicultural aspect. We just didn’t recognize ourselves in it. I wanted to change that then.”
Aattache tried with the first Dutch martial arts film Fighting fish also brought other cultures and styles to the fore, but flopped mercilessly. Partly because the film came out on the same day as, yes, Shouf shouf habibi !. At that time he met actor Mohammed Chaara, who was one of the first Dutch-Moroccan actors to break through with Shouf and The schnitzel paradise . “Mo and I just wanted to make those kinds of films, with a little more color before and behind the scenes. We just missed that a bit.”
Catalyst
The driving force and ultimate catalyst behind the entire multicultural film hype was Mimoun Oaïssa. Lead actor of Shouf and also the initiator of that film. Oaïssa: “Film in the Netherlands was simply stark white. Just as it once was in America, but there they have started making more and more films with and about black Americans, or Americans with Italian descent such as The godfather . I went to drama school and saw my Dutch classmates take on all kinds of roles that I simply never qualified for. I thought: I can wait until I’m 80 and play a Moroccan grandfather, but I’m sure there is more to it.”
“My role model in that respect is Sylvester Stallone. Not the very best actor and he had difficulty getting a job. But he did have the drive and perseverance to write and play roles that he was good at, such as Rocky, and to sell that. The perfect example of how if you fully commit to something, it can work out. I then went to Albert ter Heerdt with a few ideas and spent a summer sparring with him. He then wrote the script for this Shouf, with me in the leading role. The latter was of course non-negotiable,” Oaïssa adds with a laugh.
Koolhoven is not surprised by that success and that of new films such as The Tattas : “There is just a hunger for those films. In complicated times we want to see simple entertainment. And those films are not all that politically correct, there is an audience for that.”
Oaïssa remembers when they wanted to raise money for Shouf at a film fund, they thought very differently about it: “Amusing script, but with such a cast it is ‘box-office poison’, Oaïssa quotes. So they practically said that we had to replace the bigger roles with white people, then it would score. Fortunately, we didn’t stop there and with Najib Amhali we already had a better known name with a Moroccan background. That does make a difference. Just like Jandino Asporaat was already a well-known name before he made those Bon Bini films.”
Influencers
If there is a secret behind the success of these multicultural comedies, it is casting, Aattache continues: “That is perhaps where we spend most of our time. That’s so important for a movie like The Tattas or Scotoe (Aattache’s latest film releasing next month). With good casting you can quickly appeal to the widest possible audience. I prefer to do the casting myself, because I notice that casting agencies often come up with the same names. I want to surprise and give opportunities to lesser-known names or influencers who would like to act in a feature film. Often I just send them a DM. So we got in Scotoe a number of well-known supermodels and also a former football player in the person of former Dutch international Eljero Elia. I heard that he would like to be in a movie. Well, let’s do that anyway!”
When asked whether this trend is good for Dutch film culture, Koolhoven responds mainly positively, but adds a comment: “It is nice that there is a large audience for this from all corners of society, but combining that with films that also little has happened yet to be artistically responsible. That really is our Achilles heel. A combination of high-quality productions and films for a large audience must be made, so that we have a better international position. That is the challenge for all makers.”
Aattache agrees: “A film like that Intouchables is my ultimate example in that regard. Multicultural, lots of humor, but also just a very good film with a deeper layer. It would be extremely good for the Dutch film industry if we could also make such a film.”