Matroos (1998)
This is a candy colored, stunningly photographed wordless romance between a young man living in Belgium and a Dutch sailor or ‘matroos’. The man in Belgium is played by Joram Schurmans, who is called Joram Roodhooft. The sailor is played by Tom de With, who uses his own name for the role. Some have compared the look of the film to the work of the French photographers Pierre et Gilles, and there is a lot of that hot house atmosphere and those saturated colors here, but the look of the film, I would say, is more like the initial, nonsexual scenes in a Tom of Finland comic book–stalwart, stunningly handsome young naifs in a clean-lined 1950s world. A lot of the scenes are clearly filmed against a green screen or a back projection. And other scenes are clearly in beautiful sets. It is beautiful and theatrical, like a more delicate version of ‘Querelle’. The boys kiss on the beach, two stunningly handsome young men. As the sailor travels to exotic climes, such as Ecuador, they send to one another an erotically suggestive tropical flower, and then, over and over, the same chocolate bar. In the end, when they feel they must go their separate ways, drifting apart and fearful of the world in which they live, the scenes take place very much in the real world, at a dock and its attendant sheds. Yet the look of the film–the colors and the grain of the film stock, look like authentic 1950s documentary footage–real yet artificial, still beautiful.
Ovaj kratki film o tinejdžeru koji sanja o mornaru koji luta morem prateći zvjezde i svetionike kako bi se vratio kući me je podsjetio ne nekadašnja moja sanjarenja kada bih kao klinac noću ležao na taraci i gledao u zvjezde. Znao sam sva sazvježđa, imena zvijezda i priče o njima. Nekako sam ih uvjek povezivao sa mojom omiljenom knjigom Mali Princ, a najupečatljivija priča mi je bila ona o zvjezdi na kojoj je bio samo jedan svjetionik sa svjetioničarem. Tamo negdje daleko je bio završetak mog dalekog putovanja. Nije još završio pa vam ne znam reći tačno gdje je to.
Bavo Defurne
Bavo Defurne is a European Filmmaker mostly known for his prize winning short film work. He was born in Ghent on 8 June 1971. Bavo Defurne grew up in a village close to Oostende, Belgium. Bavo studied film and video at St. Lukas Art School in Brussels.
Before he focussed his career on directing, Defurne worked as assistant director on experimental filmmaker Matthias Müller’s shorts Alpsee (1995) and Pensao Globo (1997). Bavo was a set decorator on many films, like Peter Greenaway’s The Baby of Mâcon (1993) and Vincent Bal’s De man van Staal (1999).
His first short video, Atlantis, already demonstrated Defurne’s themes – the body and the power of nature and silence.
His film work includes Particularly now, In Spring, Saint, Matroos and Campfire.
Besides directing, he now teaches Film and Video Art at the Art Academy in Oostende and works as a photographer.
“Watching the short films of Belgian film director Bavo Defurne, four of which have recently been released on DVD under the title Campfire (Strand Video), can be both an aesthetically pleasing and an emotionally bittersweet experience. Defurne, 31, perfectly evokes the aching adolescent longings of gay teenagers while setting them within experimental visual settings—some reminiscent of Pierre et Gilles, others of Carl Theodor Dreyer.” (Mike Goodridge, The Advocate, February 18, 2003). —Wikipedia
