‘My film comes from the fear that your parents will die’

It has to be the most Dutch scene in a recent Dutch film: the one in which Iris (Julia Akkermans) and her brother put stickers on their father’s household effects to be divided, in Pink Moon. A father who wants to celebrate his 75th birthday with euthanasia, even though he is still healthy. Our practical, liberal and unceremonious national character captured on film. And of course there are those few items on which both children stick their stickers.

During the screening at the Tribeca Film Festival in New York, where Floor van der Meulen’s feature film (33) had its world premiere earlier this summer, there was a lot of laughter. And afterwards there were the questions for the filmmaker: is that really the case, or is it made up? “Yeah really,” I said. And not just when someone dies: even if we divorce, we Dutch people will also put stickers on them. It’s something very Dutch, I’m noticing that now that I’m showing my film in other countries. In Mexico, a boy also asked about it afterwards: what about those stickers? But the humor of the scene came across well: such a feud between brother and sister is also something universal. And of course there were questions about the legal side, especially in New York: is this allowed with you? Euthanasia is seen there as a very Dutch thing.’

Is your film about euthanasia?

“Well, no, not really, I guess. Rather about a completed life, which is different from euthanasia. And the film is told from Iris’s perspective: it is her experience and her reaction to her father’s wish. A coming-of-age story of a woman in her early 30s, who has to break free from her family.’

Anyone who oversees Van der Meulen’s film career could conclude that it is shooting in all directions. Graduated from the Willem de Kooning Academy in Rotterdam with a poetic short film, then widely talked-show guest with her NPO documentary Stormers of Paradise, in which she was one of the first Dutch television makers to penetrate more deeply into Syrians and their loved ones. Then winner of the prize for best European short film with 9 Days: From My Window in Aleppodirected with Thomas Vroege and Issa Touma. Back to fiction with her television drama in freedom, with a Golden Calf for actress Nazmiye Oral. Then a full-length documentary about the very last northern white rhinoceros, The Last Male on Earth. And now her feature film debut, about contemporary Iris.

Is there a line, from Syria migrants and white male rhinoceroses to the wandering thirty-something Iris?

‘Hmm. Earlier today, a journalist pointed out to me that all my work is related to impermanence, mortality and death. More than I realised, actually. And where does that come from? I don’t have an immediate answer to that. There is a certain fascination for violence, both in documentaries and in fiction: what we do to each other. The inability to fathom the other as well.

‘More than those other films, which were also about mortality or impermanence, is Pink Moon based on a personal fear of mine: that your parents will die. As a child I dreamed that they were no longer there, real nightmares that often returned. And when I passed 30, I suddenly realized: shit, they’re getting old. That, like Iris in the film, you still want to fathom your father before he slips away from you. Who is that man? What if that father suddenly appears to want to get out? That’s how the idea for a movie was born.

‘I came into contact with the screenwriter Bastiaan Kroeger through my producer, and we clicked immediately. Bastiaan has a similar relationship with his father, another taciturn and somewhat inscrutable man. It’s a whole generation I think.’

Is such an inscrutable father accompanied by an inscrutable mother?

‘In my case, yes. I have a fairly present and dominant mother, who didn’t fall for her mouth. That’s also why my father fell for her, he once told me.’

After the sudden death of Rutger Hauer, whom she had in mind for the father role and to whom she Pink Moon had already sent, the part went to Johan Leysen, the Fleming with the face of a Roman emperor in the autumn of his life.

‘If you are looking for a Dutch actor in his 70s, the pool is not that big. Johan has something determined about him, it cannot be tampered with. It is a difficult role: that father hardly evaluates. How do you remain somewhat sympathetic? And then that lived face of his, with those clear blue eyes. Eyes that radiate life. During shooting, Johan was sometimes diametrically opposed to the character he is playing.’

I read that he thought the father in the movie was a dick?

‘If we turned and I cried cut, he walked away from the set. A little later I found him outside, smoking. And muttering to himself: God damn, what an asshole, why is he doing that? So I caught him a few times. Johan also has children of his own. He could not understand the choice of his character. That also shows how phenomenal Johan is as an actor: he can play a role that completely contradicts himself.’

Are we Dutch good at death?

‘No, I do not think so. I just came back from Mexico, where people have a very different relationship with death than we do. Death doesn’t mean out of there right away. You can still talk or drink with the spirits of your ancestors, that is quite normal. Not that it’s necessarily a bad thing with us, but the funerals or cremations that I’ve been through, I often found completely uncomfortable, with that slice of cake and such a script. That is also typically Dutch: that we structure it completely, so as not to get lost in the emotion. My in-laws are Surinamese, a funeral there is very different: everyone comes in white, there is singing.’

Unlike usual in many Dutch films, Iris does not have to Pink Moon now not to get a man.

‘Lovely isn’t it? So nice! We did play with the idea: would she have a boyfriend? And if not, is she pathetic? Is that how you look at her? But then I thought: bullshit, as if you couldn’t have a good life without a relationship. That’s one of those images we’ve all created together, that women in their thirties without a man are pathetic or desperate.

‘The funny thing is: it was only after I started making films myself that I realized how much that perspective of the woman was missing. It’s changing now, thankfully. Although they are still often of those serviceable roles. Or then you see that one hysterical woman again. But now I say ‘hysterical woman’ and at the same time I think: women also have emotions. Why do we even label that as hysterical? And not with a man?

‘As a woman you can also be guilty of this: female filmmakers grew up just as well with all those films by men and those male gaze. You may also look or direct with that look, it’s that deep. I’ve started paying attention to it when I watch movies. Are only the buttocks of the woman in the picture or also that of the man?

Scarlett Johansson’s buttocks in that opening shot of Lost in Translationthat is very bad male gaze. But why shouldn’t you do it? And what if that image has meaning for the story Sofia Coppola wants to tell? There’s a blowjob scene in it Pink Moon to which the response is very varied. Some women find it extremely misogynistic, other women say: yes! It’s not dirty or humiliating either, just something women can enjoy too. Women suck, that’s what they do. So I thought, as a female filmmaker: that just has to be in that film of mine.’

Seeking women in their thirties have been popping up more often in films lately.

‘Yeah, last year in The Worst Person in the World and Hytti No 6. Very good female characters. Interesting that we’re all into this, I thought when I saw them. When you think of the coming-of-age genre, you think of teenagers, while I have the idea that thirty is the coming-of-age moment these days. When I see those films, I also think: maybe there was just not so much attention previously for the female perspective, for women who make their voices heard. It is interesting that both The Worst Person in the World if Hytti No 6 was made by a man.’

What does that say?

Van der Meulen laughs. ‘That there is a generation of men who can relate to women well? Those movies show that for me. And hopefully there will now also be films by women who portray an interesting and layered male character, that would be nice too.’