THE STORY OF NE KUKO
Short | 25 m | 2023
The story of how the mysterious power statue of Chief Ne Kuko was stolen should not be forgotten. Trapped behind glass, this nkisi resides in an European museum far away from his Congolese home. In THE STORY OF NE KUKO, the voice of an ancestor brings the nkisi's past to life. The history behind the statue links restitution activist Mwazulu Diyabanza, whose mission is to return African objects to their homeland, to the small village of Kikuku in the mountains of Boma, Democratic Republic of Congo. The true meaning of Ne Kuko's sculpture unfolds.
DOXY, EOdocs
WHEN YOU HEAR THE DIVINE CALL
Short | 20 m | 2020
Filmmaker Festus Toll follows his uncles footsteps back to Kenya and investigates how three different generations of his family experience the concepts of 'home': his uncle, his newly born nephew Genson and himself.
Moral issues and the personal quest for identity come together
in an essayistic documentary about a European-African child.
BOONDOCS, VPRO
NFF
Best directorial debut
Nomination
2020
WE WILL MAINTAIN
Short | 35 m | 2017
A child looks into the camera. His Kenyan uncle makes a prediction: a mixed child does not belong to Africa or Europe. Now, twelve years later, the child is a filmmaker in search of the meaning of his uncle’s prophetic words. As he travels from his hometown Helmond to Nairobi, the birthplace of his mother, from the Bijlmer Bajes prison to Breda where extreme right politician Geert Wilders is campaigning, he discovers that these worlds that are all part of the filmmaker’s life, do not communicate with each other, but are separated by fear of the other.
TENT Academy Award
Best Graduation Film
2017
NFF Tuschinski Award
Nomination
2017
NFF Special Jury Award
Nomination
2017​