Amsterdam Weekly: Vol 5 Issue 30, 7-13 Aug 2008

Volume 5, Issue 30

7 - 13 AUGUST 2008 Smog- and steroid-free since Athens

‘ ... for once, don’t let the devil have the best tunes.’ page 10

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FEATURE

NATURE

FILM

AGENDA

Chinese journalism gets all the bad press but ain’t all bad press.

Horsetail was eaten by dinosaurs and is a wicked antioxidant.

The private lives of female private detectives in Mataharis.

A week of virtuous sailors, virtuoso families and one lady of bad taste.

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Page 11 and onward...

Amsterdam Weekly_7-13 August 2008

In this issue and...

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Attachments

12 WIPKIPPEN

By Arnoud Holleman

As part of the preparations for the Olympics, the Chinese government issued ‘General Rules for Etiquette with Foreigners’: ‘One’s manners and bearing, and image should be graceful; Be neither humble nor haughty, but at ease and self possessed; Seek commonalities while reserving differences, have reason and integrity; Adapt to others’ customs, respect ethical code; Abide by agreements, adhere to promises; Be enthusiastic in moderation, differentiate between insiders and outsiders; Be appropriately modest; Be affirmed in yourself; Do not ask private questions, respect others’ customs; Ladies first, be gentlemanly; Seat honoured guests on the right, and get along harmoniously; Don’t ask about income or expenses; Don’t ask about age; Don’t ask about love life or marriage; Don’t ask about health; Don’t ask about someone’s home or address; Don’t ask about personal experience; Don’t ask about religious beliefs or political views; Don’t ask what someone does; You should use polite and standard forms of address for handicapped athletes; Try to keep as light as you can with handicapped overtones; Pay attention to how you congratulate handicapped athletes...’ Wow, it sounds like everything is covered. Let the games begin!

Features Inbox Tibet/China . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 Nature Calls Horsetail. . . . . . . . . . . . 4 News Journalism in China . . . . . . . . . 5 Amstergraph ADHD. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5 A Quick Bike Fix Downpour . . . . . . 5 Street Fashion A holiday . . . . . . . . . 6 Report 13 isolations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 The People Versus Canal cruisers . 6 Main feature A South African exile. . 8 3 Questions Jenny Owen Youngs . . . . 13 Lekker Bezig Chocolateer . . . . . . . 16 Film Review Mataharis . . . . . . . . . . 17

Agenda Short List 11 / Music 12 / Clubs 13 / Gay & Lesbian 13 / Stage 13 / Events 14 / Art 14 / Addresses 16 / Film 17 / Film Times 19

Plus The Mouth Sal Gorda . . . . . . . . . . . . 21 A Night in the Life Twstd . . . . . . . . 21 Classifieds . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22 Eefje Wentelteefje . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23

On the cover Illustration by Job Wouters www.letman.com

Next week Cruising down the river

Contact Amsterdam Weekly Publisher Yuval Sigler Director Todd Savage Editor Steve Korver Agenda Editor Steven McCarron Film Editor Julie Phillips Copy Editor Mark Wedin Editorial Assistant Sarah Gehrke Art Director Bas Morsch Summer Eyeball Guru Simon Wald-Lasowski Production Designers Mattijs Arts, Russell Joyce Account Managers Marc Devèze, Simone Klomp Classifieds Kate Hutchinson Distribution Manager Patrick van der Klugt Finance Eugene Moriarty Printer Corelio Printing

Amsterdam Weekly is published every week on Wednesday and is available free at locations all over Amsterdam. Subscriptions are available for €60 per six months within the Netherlands and €90 per six months within Europe. Agenda submissions are welcome, at least two weeks in advance. New contributors are invited to visit Amsterdam Weekly’s website for contributor guidelines. Contents of Amsterdam Weekly (ISSN 1872-3268) are copyright 2008 Amsterdam Weekly BV. All rights reserved.

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Amsterdam Weekly_7-13 August 2008

AROUND TOWN

Inbox

For a broader view on Tibet. And China.

Nature calling

By Mark Wedin

Submitted by: Stewart Watters Function: Government Relations Director, International Campaign for Tibet (www.savetibet.org) By: email Date: 4 August In mid-March this year, as unrest spread across the Tibetan Plateau, my colleague and I boarded flights bound for Beijing. Our task was to immediately brief European embassies there on the developing situation in Tibet, as reports emerged from Tibet of rapidly spreading protests that came to represent the most significant challenge to the Chinese government’s control of Tibet since the Dalai Lama’s escape in 1959.

Within days, the uprising spread across Tibet, in what the Dalai Lama called a sign of the Tibetans’ ‘deep resentment’. The International Campaign for Tibet (ICT) documented 125 protests across 52 locations. Despite the violence that erupted in Lhasa, all other protests appear to have been without violence.

To date, the Tibet Government in Exile reports over 200 Tibetans killed by security forces and thousands of ‘disappearances’—cases where people have been taken from their homes and their fate is still unknown.

At the start of the week, I had travelled to Geneva to deliver a statement at the UN Human Rights Council calling on the Chinese government to show restraint in dealing with the peaceful protests of Lhasa’s monks following the 10th March anniversary of the Dalai Lama’s escape from Tibet. By Friday, 14 March, reports arrived at ICT of violence in Lhasa. By the end of that day we knew that Chinese armoured personnel carriers were on the capital’s streets and that there had been fatalities on both sides. By Sunday, I was headed for Beijing.

Over the next three days, we briefed staff from almost every European embassy in Beijing. There was an air of extreme tension as embassy staff and we at ICT tried to keep up with the sheer pace of reports coming out of Tibet. Turning on the hotel television to get some kind of update from the BBC and CNN, we were continuously frustrated as Chinese censors cut the broadcasts, leaving only your own reflection in an empty black screen.

My overwhelming memory of the trip was a taxi ride we took out to the futuristic Olympic Stadium, ‘the Bird’s Nest’, in the early morning before the day’s meetings. Instead of feeling any Olympic spirit, what occupied our minds were the three black cars with blacked-out windows that trailed our taxi’s every turn. The embassies had warned: ‘If stopped, whatever you do, do not hand over your passport.’

People often get the impression that China is one thing; that its 1.3 billion people all hold the same views on the Olympics, Tibet, human rights and all the other subjects deemed sensitive by their government. The reality is that inside China there are countless numbers of individuals and groups who want to see the Chinese government respect the rule of law, and who defend free speech and freedom of religion. Despite the personal dangers, scores of Chinese human rights lawyers offered to defend Tibetans arrested during the recent protests. Chinese intellectuals and officials have called for Beijing to engage the Dalai Lama to find a peaceful solution to the Tibet issue.

As European leaders arrive in Beijing, the least they can do is clearly defend the rights of those who risk themselves and their families daily for a more just and open China, but who don’t have the protection of an EU passport in their pocket.

Got an opinion? We want to hear it. inbox@amsterdamweekly.nl

Photo by Krista van der Niet

Tasting pre-history It’s fairly easy to eat one of the oldest inhabitants on earth. And, as you might guess, a small green shoot with 375-million-years of perfected DNA is naturally chock full of goodness. So why do so few chomp down on free, abundant horsetail weeds (AKA heermoes or paardenstaart)? Besides the fact that they are weeds and dogs probably pee on them, there’s no easy answer.

Historically they’re one of the best survivors around.

They’ve even outlasted cockroaches—and that’s saying something. When dinosaurs came about, horsetails were as big as trees, and it’d be safe to say brontosauruses enjoyed them as high-calcium and potassium snacks—if only brontosauruses had existed. (Long story short: what we originally thought was a brontosaurus was just the skull of an apatosaurus on the body of something else.)

Fast-forward past the favourite snack of the dilaposaur (that’s better), and you’ll find the ancient Romans putting young horsetail whorls in their salads. Further forward and closer to home, milkmaids used them to clean out their buckets. Maybe this was when horsetails lost their label as food, and became in many minds a tool. Covered in silica crystals, they’re particularly useful in light carpen-

try and metal work. They’ll toughen your fingernails, and do a number on your pots and pans. Getting hungry yet?

Easier to swallow perhaps, is their use medicinally.

Properly prepared , horsetails can work wonders on bladder and kidney problems, or prostate and urinary infections (note to chefs: don’t mention this on the menu). The stems are full of antioxidants and, diluted in water, they’ll even cure pink eye!

At the moment, the only folks who eat them regularly are the Japanese, who relish a good platter of sauteed tsukushi (they also blanch them like string beans). These days, with the combination of rain and summer sun, horsetails are popping up all over. They’re usually found in parks and gardens, often alongside water. And remember: just because a brontosaurus never ate one, doesn’t mean that you can’t.

Special thanks to palaeobiologist Natasja den Ouden.

Got nature tips? naturecalls@amsterdamweekly.nl

Amsterdam Weekly_7-13 August 2008

AROUND TOWN

Press freedom

By Floris Dogterom

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Google this...

‘Olympians manufactured’ Amstergraph Number of prescriptions per year for Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder in the Netherlands.

1998 - 100,000 / 2000 - 180,000 / 2002 - 210,000 / 2004 - 300,000 / 2006 - 470,000 / 2008 - 730,000* *Estimate based on first quarter 2008 Source: Stichting Farmaceutisch Kengetallen

Chinese journalism As diverse as the country itself.

Graph by Nicole Martens

Photo by Denis Koval

typical reaction of a Westerner to the notion of Chinese journalism would probably include such phrases as ‘statecontrolled’, ‘no freedom of the press’ and ‘communist party’. But according to a panel discussion at SMART Project Space last month, this is a rather narrow view. The topic of discussion was ‘Picturing in/outside China: Chinese art and journalism’. Professor Hugo de Burgh of the China Media Centre of the University of Westminster (UK) stated that, ‘the Communist party does have a lot of control, but there is a lot of variety. The press is far freer than before. You can talk about almost every topic.’ In regard to the prosecution of journalists he also sought to put things into perspective: ‘Momentarily there are fifty-four journalists in prison; which is not many for such a large population.’

Two Dutch Chinese journalists, Bei Wang of the Chinese department of Radio Netherlands Worldwide and Hong Tung Wu of Chinese Radio & TV Amsterdam, who also participated in the panel discussion, both agree with De Burgh’s views. ‘It’s much more open than ten years ago, when I was still living there,’ says Wang. ‘In part, that has to do with the shifting political direction of the country. The focus is now more on corruption. What’s more, China is huge and there is so much happening.’

Because of that diversity, he says the media are diverse, too. ‘South China, for instance, is a bit more open than the rest of the country, perhaps because it is close to Hong Kong. The Shanghai media are more international, because it is an inter-

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national city. And in Nanjing, my own city, the TV programmes run more news items on social issues than elsewhere, something that corresponds with the local culture.’

Still, both journalists say there are certain topics that remain off-limits.

Examples include human rights, Taiwan, Tibet and Falun Gong, the spiritual movement much distrusted by the Chinese government. Hu says, ‘The only way the government deals with the human rights topic is in strengthening the national cause, by claiming that human rights are a Western way to break the national unity.’

Wang adds, ‘Of course, if I want to find out more about the torturing of a Falun Gong member, I don’t start looking for information in the Chinese media. I won’t find it there.’ It’s more likely that she would have more success on one of the many blogs. As in other parts of the world, the internet has stimulated civil journalism in China. Wang says that many Chinese trust what they read on blogs more than they do official news websites, and rightly so. But the blogs do have drawbacks. ‘The problem is that blogs are personal things,’ says Hu. ‘Generally you’ll find many opinions there, and few facts.’

Wang adds, ‘Even the so-called journalistic blogs aren’t all that trustworthy, although they do use different sources.’

Meanwhile the government does its very best to filter information before it reaches the Chinese general public. Wang talks about social activists she knows who run a blog. Every once in a while the government shuts them down, after which the activists cheerfully set it up again. ‘It’s a cat and mouse game,’ says

Wang. ‘Sometimes people are arrested, but only very few.’

The Chinese site of Radio Netherlands Worldwide was also unreachable for a short period of time. ‘Perhaps it had something to do with the Tibet article we published,’ says Wang. ‘Incidentally, it was a regional thing. In one city you had access to the website, in another you hadn’t. And there will always be people who know how to get around a firewall.’

With the Olympic Games in Beijing, it will be interesting to observe how freely the many foreign journalists flocking there can report. ‘The government promised a lot, but there will be many limitations,’ says Hu. He seems to be right. Only last week, international journalists who were already in Beijing couldn’t download an Amnesty International report in which the human rights organisation requested the immediate release of four human rights activists from Chinese prisons. After Jacques Rogge, chairman of the International Olympic Committee, had protested against the measure, the authorities were quick to lift the ban—something Wang had already predicted in the interview, when she said that ‘the Chinese government will hope to show how well China is doing.’

Both Hu and Wang believe that Chinese journalism will only improve. ‘Just look back ten years and compare journalism to then,’ says Hu. ‘It will continue to grow.’ Although there will still be difficulties on the way.

More info at: www.freevoice.nl www.wan-press.org www.freedomhouse.org

A quick bike fix

By Pete Jordan

Downpour The dark, menacing cloud ahead means trouble. It also means I need to find shelter, a hiding place—something! And quick.

Cycling southward on Marnixstraat from Haarlemerplein, I see nothing but a long, unbroken facade of apartment blocks—a seemingly endless stretch without awnings or overhangs. At the Eerste Marnixplantsoen, there’s a telephone booth. Yes! But it’s occupied. The bus stop shelter!

Already packed with a crowd.

I pedal faster but am immediately overtaken by another cyclist. As he zips by, I notice the back of his shirt has five or six dark stains, each the size of a plum. My eyes fixate on the curious stains for a moment. Then another cyclist shoots past.

This guy’s shirt has the same dark stains.

Wait, no... not stains, huge wet spots. Rain drops? But how? We haven’t reached the storm yet. Unless...

I look over my shoulder. A solid black mass looms above. Ack! Now frantic, I haul ass. There’s gotta be some place to hide, some safe haven! But this stretch of Marnixstraat is barren; I’m completely exposed. Then, without even the slightest foreplay of raindrops, the floodgates open. Within seconds, the search for sanctuary becomes pointless.

I’m thoroughly soaked—as if I’d ridden my bike straight into the Singelgracht. Since I can’t get any wetter, I slow down—and try to keep in mind that at least it’s a warm rain.

React: bikes@amsterdamweekly.nl

Amsterdam Weekly_7-13 August 2008

AROUND TOWN

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Street fashion

By Mo Veld

The people versus...

By Floris Dogterom

Fashion holiday Phew! It’s August and the whole international fashion world is on holiday. Time to go on strike, stop consuming and dig into your closet and rediscover some old summer gear loaded with fun memories. I have a specific tank top that does it for me every year. It has the tackiest Hawaiian-print ever, but the colours are great, aqua blue and flamingo pink, and I did a pretty good job customising it—decades ago—into a sexy little cut-up number. I remember once on a tropical night, I had it on and jumped into the IJ. And whenever I’m tempted to pull it from underneath one of my T-shirt stacks, I know it’s time for a serious fashion holiday.

Summer makes us realise that we just might be taking things a bit too seriously. So the other day I let my 15-month-old son pick a T-shirt for me at the pet store. It has a shrimp-ish pink colour and a huge cat face on it with lovely blue eyes.

He pointed it out going ‘ga ga ga!!!’, as babies do when they really fancy something. So I thought, ‘What the heck.’ He was right, it is cute—and for only €11, a true fashion holiday.

Back home I was confronted with a few styling challenges but I managed to find the right jeans—with flares—to go with it and dug up some big blue vintage sunglasses to reflect the giant

cat eyes. (This styling neurosis— because that’s what it really is —never gets a holiday.)

On the street I noticed the pink cat is not only attractive to babies.

I got a lot more ‘hey pretty eyes’ compliments and smiley faces thrown my way than I normally do in this town. In my humble opinion, August in Amsterdam could do with a bit more ‘inner child’ peeping through in our daily attire.

And in the process, we might just become a bit more flirtatious with each other in the process.

I started digging up more oldies and now find myself assembling experimental ‘slack’ outfits almost every day. It feels deliciously rebellious. I guess style-neurotics like myself just live their lives as if there’s always a camera around, just like religious people think ‘god’ is always watching. Well, god is in the details, even in August. But the ‘ever watchful eye’ also needs a mood lift once in a while, and I Photo by Mo Veld know I’m doing my bit cheering up the ’hood with my funky cat shirt.

The question is, what are the rest of you wearing to put a smile on this city’s face?

React: inandout@amsterdamweekly.nl

Prisons

By Sarah Gehrke

13 artists go to prison and the mood is bright Freedom. It’s quite an important issue, especially for artists. Physical freedom, financial freedom, freedom of expression: they’re all needed to create art.

Unfortunately, restraints to freedom are always to be found. Freedom is, thus, still an issue that should be pondered, worked with, and called to attention.

The 13 Isolations project does just that. And it’s not doing it by halves, either. It takes 13 artists of different nationalities and disciplines and wheels them off to Hoorn, where they’ll each be locked into an isolation cell for 29 days.

All they can take with them is the stuff they need to create their art. When they’re done doing time, they’ll have (or so it is hoped) created a piece of art that will tell us more about the influence that a lack of physical freedom and exterior inspiration can have on art.

On the day before their self-imposed imprisonment is scheduled to begin, the mood amongst the artists is surprisingly bright. Sipping tea in the idyllic surroundings of the Hilton garden terrace, the artists seem oblivious to the fact that this is the last time in a while they’ll be seeing the evening sun. When asked how they

feel about the lurking prospect of containment, the answers range from ‘quite excited’ to ‘very excited’ to ‘really excited’.

There is talk about the ‘peace to work without distractions’. Many people also make snide comments about mobile phones and how they look forward to their absence. In short, it looks like everyone expects to find complete freedom inside the prison walls.

But as Anthony Murrell, who has organised all this, points out: ‘This project is not about prison. It’s about different definitions of isolation.’ Prison is apparently a too narrow term for all the implications this project carries; it’s also, apparently, about climate change, poverty and food shortage. In addition, some of the sponsors don’t like to be associated with the word prison.

But of course this is about prison. The artists will be put in isolation cells, have no contact with each other or the outside world, and only very limited contact with the guards. The whole thing even takes place in a prison. So, sorry Hilton Hotel, but you have sponsored a project about prison. Although none of the prisoners-tobe seem to mind. ‘I look forward to seeing

my big prison space.’ ‘I look forward to being there inside the prison.’ ‘I hope it will open me up.’ Those are the comments now. Let’s see what they say in a month. www.13isolations.com

Illustration by Tomas Schats

Pleasure or money trip?

The St Nicolaas Boat Club of Amsterdam has something against the rondvaartboten that take tourists on a canal trip. According to the club’s website, the big tour boat companies ‘give bad tours. They’re too big for the canals. There is nothing historic or Dutch about them. They’re aggressive drivers.’ And so on.

Arguably, the St Nicolaas Boat Club itself does have a sense of history. They have two tuindersvletten (market gardeners’ flatboats), which were originally used to transport vegetables and cattle in the watery parts of the country.

Contrary to the rondvaartboten, St Nicolaas Boat Club is not a commercial enterprise, or so claims Nicole Mischler, chairwoman of the foundation that runs the club, and one of the volunteer captains of the boats. ‘We take donations at the end of every trip and use it to maintain the boats.

But Binnenwater Beheer Amsterdam [BBA, the city department that manages the canals], claims we let people pay. As of 2005 they are trying to blow us out of the water.’

Mischler says this stems from the fact that people who have taken a boat ride with the club report about it on the internet, saying that tourists are being asked ten euros at the end of the trip. ‘This gives BBA the impression that we are running a company.’

Greetje Oosting, BBA spokeswoman, says that the reactions on the internet of enthusiastic tourists ‘will never be of any influence on our decision whether St Nicolaas Boat Club is commercial or not.’

Oosting denies that BBA is the lap dog of the big tour boat companies, who, according to Mischler, ‘don’t want us on the water.’ Oosting: ‘The rondvaartboten have nothing to do with this case.’

To me, Mischler has sufficiently proven that she and her pals are running a foundation, not a commercial company. And the tuindersvletten are indeed a great way to explore this beautiful town. That said, Mischler is whining too much about the rondvaartboten. True, they’re bulky and stinky. But hundreds of thousands of tourists every year take pleasure in a ride. And for most of the year, it would seem to be the right choice. After all, where would you rather be on a cold and rainy day: on an open boat or in a comfy lounge on the water?

Something to report? thepeopleversus@amsterdamweekly.nl

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F E AT U R E

Amsterdam Weekly_7-13 August 2008

Amsterdam Weekly_7-13 August 2008

F E AT U R E

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DON’T TRY THIS AT HOME Nelson Mandela celebrated his 90th birthday recently, and South Africans around the world celebrated with him. But for many, the occasion was a moment for reflection too. South African writer Richard Jurgens looks back to his own time in Amsterdam around the great man’s release in 1990, and how by-ways became highways to a rainbow-coloured world...

By Richard Jurgens / Illustrations by Job Wouters is first place in this city was an attic, situated at the top of five flights of stairs. The floor was the ceiling of the apartment below. Though it was heavily carpeted, you could hear everything that happened downstairs.

The two Russian couples who lived there liked to party around the heavy coffee table in their sitting room. They’d invite friends over, produce packets of product, open a couple of bottles of vodka, and yell into the small hours. When the party was over, the men would take their girlfriends to bed and pogo their bedsteads for awhile before settling into heavy silence. Finally, as the sun rose, his ears still ringing with sliding vowels, he would fall asleep.

He didn’t know what his downstairs neighbours looked like. But he knew what they sounded like in the morning, or when they were drunk, or when they were in the throes of orgasm. One of the men had an irritating habit of tapping a toothbrush loudly on the sink after brushing.

Another did exercises at odd hours with weights that clanked. One of the girls had a neighing laugh that made him want to storm down there and throttle her.

The rhythms of his life were determined by theirs. It was only when they went out, during the day, that he could enjoy a few hours of peace. When they were home, it was a relief not to be able to understand what they were saying.

At least that way, he could tune out.

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He was in this city by chance, after several years of wandering in Africa. Now he was part of another South African exile community, and wherever his compatriots were, there were committees, political debates, cultural evenings and special awareness-raising events. People on either side of a given dividing line are often more similar than they like to think. Northern Ireland, Israel... South Africa. That had been the lesson of his rite of passage. So there was some dutifulness in his involvement.

Still, it was reassuring to be a part of the exiles’ world.

It brought him into contact with the flavours and accents of home. It was good to be doing something, even in the security of your overseas location, to alleviate the condition of the people back home. Though the exile community in this city was never central to the worldwide ‘external struggle’, it was certainly emblematic of it. Inevitably, there were ideological rifts, dark suspicions and personal vendettas. There were remarks, incidents, posturings, unmaskings, threats against persons.

Things went ahead as planned, or they did not. Everything depended on the outcome of tortuous negotiations between parties whose motives weren’t clear.

One day, he passed the Russians on the stairs. He wasn’t surprised to see that the men were cynical, hard-body types, or that their girlfriends were oval-faced and brightly lipsticked. They were like feral animals dressed up in the latest fashionable clothes. But something about them was appealing. They were enjoying every minute of their lives in this city, partying, doing drugs, escaping the last vestiges of communism.

A few weeks later he was surprised to find a note on the stair, written in barely legible Latin characters, inviting him to visit them. He seized the opportunity. Yep, there were the white leather couches that he’d imagined, brand new, and the glass-topped coffee table. There was the spotless kitchen and the iron bedsteads glimpsed through the half-open doors of bedrooms... The Russians were pleasant enough, but the purpose of the invitation was more than a

burst of good neighbourliness. Having poured out the Stolichnaya, the men asked him, quite seriously, to ‘look after’ the girls while they were away on a business trip.

But the girls looked quite capable of looking after themselves, and did. While the cats were away, the mice held late-night parties on their own account, with the Rolling Stones and Madonna roaring on the stereo and unfamiliar men’s voices droning on and on, until the bedsteads began to creak. And that woman’s irritating laugh, goddammit...

One evening, he went to a concert organised by the ‘nonaligned, progressive’ organisation that he worked for at the university cultural centre where they had offices and shared access to the well-equipped bar. The occasion was People’s Day and the room was packed with blacks, whites and locals keen to be in on a happening exotic scene. They danced to some white rasta and surf rock from two bands formed by some of the war resistors, jived to the energy of the great Thandi Vilakazi and listened to the star: Mzhwake Mbuli, in town for a gig at the Melkweg, gracing them with his enormous presence and slick, powerful show. ‘Change is pain.’ Too right.

A real jol was building. The energy of that night pointed to a new culture, or vibe, or scene, what you will, that seemed to express a country that might one day come to be. But, then, toward the end of the evening, a man got up on stage and began to sing blues in Afrikaans to a pounding boogie piano. It was the legendary Johannes Kerkorrel. He and his Gereformeerde Blues Band had helped to change the musical and mental landscape of some of the people there, anyway, forever.

For perhaps 30 seconds, the crowd listened in amazement. And then a habit of the struggle, which saw all Afrikaners as guilty as sin, asserted itself. Someone at the back said, a little experimentally: ‘Boer!’ And soon others had taken up the cry. Before long the room was loud with boos and jeers. The musician, who already looked in a very sorry state having consumed a bottle of whisky, stumbled from the stage in tears before he had completed a song.

People on either side of a given dividing line are often more similar than they like to think.

He—that is, the man I was then—decided not to have anything to do with the ‘progressive’ South Africans in this town for a while. There didn’t appear to be any others. It was at about that time that he noticed that things had gone very quiet downstairs. No parties, no Sunday lunches sending up aromas.

A few weeks later, he happened on a brief report in the paper. The day before, two Russian men in their twenties had been lying on the beach in Scheveningen with their girlfriends. Witnesses reported that a man in a suit had walked up to them and put a bullet through the back of each of man’s head, before calmly vanishing.

New people moved in downstairs.

Suddenly he felt free to really look around. He found himself noticing some extraordinarily simple things. For instance— people in this city seldom drew their curtains before bedtime, if at all. Friends attributed this habit with a wry smile to Calvinism’s emphasis on living an open, blameless

life, or appearing to. But irony didn’t stop them from continuing the tradition. It was hard not to feel like a voyeur sometimes, walking around these streets, especially at night.

He’d glance absently into an apartment in some renovated warehouse and suddenly notice a guy in his bathrobe, lit by the light of a TV, sprawled on his couch, one hand absently weighing his balls, watching football, probably, or maybe porn. Later, going past one of those lofty houses that look over the park, he'd glimpse a nymph-like naked body flitting from room to room, pursued by another one in a tuxedo. Who knew the psychodrama going on in there—the slightly disturbed rich girl, the cynical lawyer.

Later on, some woman in tears at a table with a bowl of fruit on it, ear to phone. Further on, a group eating a cosy evening meal in a basement kitchen. Then a couple of lovers yelling at each other like fishwives... And when the occupants weren’t in, they left lights on. He caught glimpses of their taste in the wall decoration: cult film posters, Indonesian masks, dramatic abstracts, formal rustic scenes and family portraits. And of their plump cats, dreaming in the window sills.

The people of this city liked having their lives on display, he concluded. In a way, it was a necessity. Apartments were carved out of the most unlikely sections of buildings: in renovated warehouses, dank basements and draughty attics. People lived here in corridors, shops, gas factories, stables, barracks, offices, old newspaper buildings and former hospitals. And in this maze-like warren of apartments, there were windows facing in every direction: dormers catching the morning sun, French windows looking over the river, skylights letting in the sky, kitchen windows facing on dark courtyards and other kitchen windows...

Wherever you looked, at whatever time, there’d always be some scene from another life going on, right there, neatly framed and lighted—and then it would be gone.

Another fact: dividing walls here are built very thin. Often the constructions dividing you from your neighbours were hardly more solid than paper.

The upstairs guy with the heavy tread. The prick next door who played the same rock station all night. The old fart downstairs with emphysema. In one place, his neighbour two floors up was a junk dealer whose business hours were between ten at night and six in the morning, so that the hallway reverberated with the sounds of his junkie customers—freakoids of the far side—going up and down the stairs all night. Granted, it wasn’t one of the better parts of town. But even in the solid apartments of the rich south you saw hand-written signs asking visitors not to slam the front door.

If you lived near one of the busiest squares, as he did for a while, you’d be kept up by the thrum and roar of crowds of people warming up to Friday night, especially in summer, as the holiday smell of hamburgers and steaks drifted on the warm breeze. If there was a big football match on, you’d know it from the roars coming from sports cafes and open windows. If there was a riot on, as sometimes happened when the home team lost (or won), you knew it from the sirens, the roars of the wild crowds trashing cafes, the screaming of tyres as the riot squad arrived, the clattering of the crowd control helicopter overhead, and the smell of tear gas lingering over the littered squares.

Later, you’d be serenaded by drunks enjoying the sounds of their own voices in the small hours. Later still you’d be woken again by the first rumbling of the early morning trams.

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Amsterdam Weekly_7-13 August 2008

F E AT U R E

The main object of life, for most of the people he knew, wasn’t work and the accumulation of wealth but self-realisation and the accumulation of pleasure. There were different approaches to this and they weren’t always obviously compatible. Although, you could be surprised.

The leather-jacketed punks looked as fierce as tribal warriors, but they were actually quite friendly when not confronting cops, and often fanatical vegetarians. The squatters looked and smelled, as if they hadn’t showered for years but they often lived in communes. They were expert at handicrafts such as jimmying doors, tapping electricity, diverting plumbing and managing intensive farming projects in confined spaces.

The crowd over at the Westergasfabriek might look as if they suffered permanent hangovers, but they put together the best happenings, where the new gabber music drove compulsive machine-like dancing through the night and performers in strange costumes swung from high wire trapezes throwing clouds of money over the (literally) ecstatic crowd—money that turned out to be roughly printed ‘bank notes from hell’... You might see Donald Gardner, the English poet, in a sumptuous four poster bed that had been nailed to the wall, reciting Baudelaire to a background of industrial noise. Later that evening you’d hear Fifi L’Amour, the Australian diva, singing songs of the Belle Epoque in the hold of the Ship of Fools.

It was all about expression; if you found a niche for yourself, you exploited it. There was Fabiola, the living art work, who was paid (it was said) a handsome subsidy to manifest at culturally significant events wearing outrageous Boy George-like outfits. There was the old hippy, Robert Jasper Grootveld, who lived in a cottage that he'd built on a polystyrene raft in the eastern harbour, now a prophet of the polystyrene age: one day, humankind would build floating cities on the stuff. There were the stand-up comedians from Chicago who’d just started the city’s first booming comedy cafe, and there was a troupe of actors from St Petersburg who performed surrealist plays in storerooms and bath houses.

The culmination of the year, in the alternative world, was the festival held every autumn in the village, Ruigoord, just outside the city. Then thousands of travellers, hippies, nature artists and New Tribalists set up camp for three or four days among the dunes to play music, take drugs, discuss routes to Nepal and fly kites at altitudes so high that they were sometimes angrily reported by the pilots guiding their planes in to land at the airport only a mile or so away.

The people in those planes must have goggled at the medieval-looking encampment below, with its burning torches, peaked tents and flying banners.

The climax was the procession on the last evening, which coincided with the solstice, when groups of artists played out ritualistic performances that featured dangerous athleticism, fire and nakedness. It was a truly Bacchic event. You woke the next day feeling empty, scoured out, and eager and ready for another year.

Even the most energetic colours, sounds, scents, jokes and ideas of an energetic counter-culture didn’t dispel the horrors that lurked in some people’s memories, or alleviate the suffering that they took with them wherever they went.

‘You said, “I will go to another land, I will go to another sea. / Another city will be found, better than this...”’

Cafavy, that great exponent of the displaced soul.

A good friend of his at the time, Englishman of Welsh origin, had a gritty tale to tell, for instance. It was this. One day his father, then a young boy, had been called to his father’s study. ‘Now you’re to be a good boy for your mother,’ said the father (the guy’s grandfather, that is). Then he tipped the boy and sent him away, and a short while later blew his own brains out with his shotgun. He’d just learned that the boy who he’d always thought was his son had been fathered by his own brother... So that from the boy’s point of view, the man he’d thought his father was his uncle, and his uncle was in fact his father. This was the man who had shaped his life—mainly by his fist. There were moments when it felt unsafe, sitting alone with him in his black, graffiti-decorated kitchen.

Then there was the woman he knew, spectacularly beautiful, a vision straight out of Botticelli, who had lived for years in a cult commune where members were not allowed to form fixed couples. She’d been drawn into the cult as a girl and for years she’d been required to sleep every night with a different man, according to a roster.

She’d finally escaped, come to this city to start a new life.

But sex, relationships and all that, didn’t appeal to her...

There was the man whose father made serious plans when he was a young boy to hand him over to an orphanage. This was after the mother had died, painfully, of cancer. The father said that his grief was too great, the boy was a reminder of what he had lost, he couldn’t bring the boy up alone... The arrangements were made, the papers signed. They’d actually driven to the orphanage and were sitting in the car making their final farewells, when Dad looked at the barbed wire and the grey walls and, finally, at the very last moment, relented.

Still, it was only after you knew someone pretty well that you learned anything personal about them. All the same, even then you couldn’t be sure.

When it was windy and grey, which it was quite often, people were grumpy and they made no effort to hide it.

This was surprising, not least because all those familiar Old Master winter scenes suggested that this was a nation that loved northern weather and understood it. You saw some of that old spirit occasionally in the cold months, on those ice-clear days when the sky was blue and the wind still, and everyone’s instinct was to go skating in Friesland. Gebakkramen, gluwein, scarves streaming in the wind... But for the most part, winter was long and dull, and most people disliked it. Service in shops, never a strong point in this city at the best of times, would be brusque. The pavements would be dangerous with

umbrellas wielded by people with their heads down. Bus drivers would snarl into the soggy wind, and close the door before you could get in.

But give these northern folk a sunny day and everything was different. At the first hint of warmth, people would set up a table on the pavement outside their front doors, and drink beer and read books. Or they’d go windsurfing in the wind-blown seas near power stations, or cycle in tight, uniformed packs along country roads, or they’d head for the park to kick balls or throw Frisbees.

Quite simply, they adored the sun. ‘... see lady with your dangerous lips / you kiss the great green wide world / you kiss and simmer.’ (Lucebert) And when the weather was fine, you saw what real water people they were, for half the city chugged round the canals in many sorts of boats, portable stereos blaring romantic ballads over the water.

History has taken several turns since then, and I have lived several other lives. I can hardly think of myself as I was then, as ‘me’, anymore; I cannot think of the man I was in the first person.

Is this an evasion, or common sense? I cannot tell. But sometimes one moment in a life tunnels through to another, like a wormhole. And it was such a moment, recently, when I turned on the radio, and heard the tributes paid to Madiba on his 90th birthday.

For I touched the hand of history briefly, once, before going my way.

He was beginning to feel that he belonged. Things would go on like this, quietly, for years. He would find a job, buy a house, whatever. And then, one morning, he turned the television on to find a broadcast of the inauguration of Nelson Mandela. Of course! He’d been so out of touch... As he watched those images of that astounding group of world leaders and opinion-makers gathering to mark that momentous occasion, the realisation flooded through him: everything had changed.

Several years before, he’d been honoured to shake Nelson Mandela’s hand. This was shortly after the old man’s release from jail, when he’d been part of a parade of ‘good South Africans’ who’d been lined up in a backroom at the airport during the leader’s first whistle-stop tour of the West. His impression of the old man had been of a very sharp, and a very great man. (Of course.) His impression of the (then) wife, however, had been somewhat different: a woman with the eyes of a cobra...

God help us, he’d thought then. This is history, not rock ’n’ roll. For once, don’t let the devil have the best tunes.

As he watched the inauguration unfold, he experienced emotions that made it clear to him that by cutting himself off from his community he had, really, lost any firm sense of who he was. As the saying goes, we are people through other people. Through our people, that is. Whoever they might be. ___

Amsterdam Weekly_7-13 August 2008

AGENDA

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SHORT LIST

Victoria Amazonica, Thursday, Hortus Botanicus.

THURSDAY 7AUGUST

FRIDAY 8 AUGUST

Event: Terra Extremitas—The End of the Earth

World/Jazz: Rosenberg Weekend

Endzeit visions are an ever-remaining favourite among artists and fantasy roleplay afficionados alike. This large-scale spectacle, that sounds a bit like a wet dream for members of both groups, has it all: A mysterious evil, here called ‘The Fiction’, has taken over the world. There’s a group of survivors hiding in a secluded spot, here called ‘The Bulkhead’. And even UFOs. All this thought up and carried out by a large number of artists of all disciplines, and taking place at a fitting Endzeit location.

(Sarah Gehrke) NDSM-werf, 20.00, €8. Until August 10.

Gutsy, spirited, virtuosic—largely unknown outside the Netherlands—The Rosenberg Trio has been leading a revival of gypsy music over the last quarter century by crosspollinating the standard (and irresistible) boom-chick, boom-chick guitar trio format with all manner of outside influences. This ‘Rosenberg Weekend’ at the Concertgebouw finds them listing in three different directions. Tonight will see the group joined by three other string players (two of whom are other Rosenbergs) in a tribute to Django, Grapelli and their French roots, while tomorrow brings guest appearances by a trio of jazz-inflected singers, lustrous Denise Jannah among them. And Sunday wraps with what promises to be a protean programme, featuring versatile pianist Louis van Dijk. In short, this band of gypsies will surely keep you moving. (Steve Schneider) Concertgebouw, Grote Zaal, 20.15, €22.50/€26.50. Until 10 August.

Art: Beyond Paradise Why is it that whenever you travel somewhere you haven’t been before, it all looks and smells and feels completely different from what you had imagined it to be like?

Okay, in the case of package holidays to ‘idyllic’ beaches the answer is kinda obvious. But what about city trips? Or, even more interestingly, weird places that have not been photographed, filmed and described a million times before, and still we have a preconception in our head about what they will be like? This exhibition looks into documentation and representation of places in our touristy times, and might answer some of the questions above. Although it possibly won’t look anything like you’d imagine it would right now. (Sarah Gehrke) Stedelijk Museum Bureau Amsterdam, 11.00-17.00, free. Until 7 September.

Club: Discocult presents The First Lady OBT Documentary film-maker Gabbi Werner left Amsterdam two years ago to re-invent herself in Vienna as a DJ: The First Lady of Bad Taste. Sure it all happened accidentally, but it turned out to be a savvy career move since whether her audience wants to or not, she always manages to sucker them into dancing to her mix of cheesy listening, electronica, exotica and even ‘krocha’ (a new sound coming from Austria that some describe as ‘easy gabber’). Tonight she will be joined by this clubnight’s regular DJs Rubedo and Graham B. (Steve Korver) Sugar Factory, 23.59-05.00, €10.

Event: Victoria Amazonica The story of the Victoria Amazonica sounds a bit like something out of a fantasy novel, or a child’s poetry book. One of the world’s largest water lilies (it has circular leaves that grow up to two metres in diameter), it only blooms at night, and only on two consecutive nights a year. The first night it blooms in pristine white; the night after, in pink. As the second morning dawns, the buds close, and the lily retreats underwater. Back in more romantic times, flower lovers would have spent every summer night by the lake, waiting for the blooms to appear. Nowadays, in a fantastically practical combination of romance and technology, you can simply have Hortus alert you with a text message when it’s time and then you can rush down and see it for yourself. Just text BLOEM AAN to 4411. No fantasy. And no dodgy ringtone contract either. (Sarah Gehrke) Hortus Botanicus, sometime at night.

SUNDAY10 AUGUST World: 4Tuoze Matroze ‘The Virtuous Sailors’ are The Pogues of the Amsterdam sea shanty. But they are also a band that doesn’t shy away from influences from North Africa, the Balkans, Suriname, and klog dancing—any influence, really, as long it has a sense of flow. They sing in Dutch but with the right attitude or beer-intake, anyone can sing along regardless, to tunes whose moods alternate between lonely introspection and raucous frolicking. In fact, during a show in Morocco, they had 10,000 locals dancing and holding up lighters. Put simply, they sing the international language of the sea. Arrr. (Steve Korver) Studio K, 20.00, free.

Send details and images for listing consideration at least two weeks in advance to agenda@amsterdamweekly.nl.

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Amsterdam Weekly_7-13 August 2008

AGENDA: MUSIC Must see: Pop/Rock

Jazz: Rosenberg Trio Guests tonight include singers Denise Jannah, Lils MacKintosh and Ronald Douglas. Those who can’t get enough Rosenberg can check out an intimate interview in the Koorzaal at 18.30. See Short List. Concertgebouw, Grote Zaal, 20.15, €22.50/€26.50 Rock: Jack’s On Five, Southern Way A hard rocking night for hard rocking people. Winston Kingdom, 21.00, €6

Sunday 10 August Pop: Non Melting Ice Cream Band Groovsters who’re so cool they don’t even melt in your mouth. Blijburg, 17.00, free Rock: Maxïmo Park The voice of vocalist Paul Smith is hardly multi-dimensional—typically bellowing passionately in a thick Geordie accent—but this energetic bunch are still abrupt, jagged and lyrically raw. Storming onto the European scene with hit single ‘Apply Some Pressure’ in 2005, they proved themselves to be much more than one-hit-wonders with last year’s follow–up album, Our Earthly Pleasures. This date breaks up their summer festival tour and may even feature some new tracks. Support from Gravenhurst. Paradiso, Grote Zaal, 19.30, sold out Folk: 4Tuoze Matroze Dramatic seamen-style choir, firmly embracing old Dutch folk traditions while tackling elements of Cuban, Suriname and Arabic song.

See Short List. Studio K, 20.00, free Jazz: Rosenberg Trio Guest tonight is pianist Louis van Dijk. See Short List. Concertgebouw, Grote Zaal, 20.15, €22.50/€26.50 Singer-songwriter: Rik van den Bosch Earnest acoustic pop. KHL Koffiehuis, 21.00, €6

The War on Drugs Paradiso, Kleine Zaal, Friday 8 August West coast sounding guitar pop with a fuzzy, noisy groove and hints of rootsy Americana. Course, they’re actually from Philadelphia. New album, Wagonwheel Blues, is just out on Secretly Canadian. 21.00, €7.50 + membership

MUSIC Thursday 7 August Classical: Christianne Stotijn The mezzo soprano is backed by pianist Julius Drake for a massive selection of Tchaikovsky works. Concertgebouw, Kleine Zaal, 20.15, €26.50 Soul: Macy Gray When this raspy soul/R&B singer burst onto the pop scene at the end of the ’90s, singing hits like ‘I Try’, she managed to get labeled bonkers by the media. Certainly, she was erratic in some performances, one time even forgetting the words to the American national anthem at a sporting event—which didn’t go down well. In this decade, the sales haven’t flowed so readily either, though she’s still shifting enough units to make most bands jealous. And she’s got enough fans here—good luck getting in tonight.

Paradiso, Grote Zaal, 20.30, sold out Singer-songwriter: Celine Cairo Eighteen-year-old local songwriter who’s into folky acoustic pop. Skek, 21.30, free Latin: Patchamama Latin American sounds, from folklore to jazz. Tonight’s guest is Venezuelan harpist Carlos Orozco. Badcuyp, Noordpool, 21.30, €8

Friday 8 August Classical: Friday Night Trio AeroDynamic, featuring students from the Conservatorium van Amsterdam, perform a Van Gogh inspired work on recorders. DJ DaanModern supplies the ambience before and after.

Van Gogh Museum, 18.30, museum entry cost

Singer-songwriter: Jayson Norris, Mike Berry Two sheep-lovin’, funkified, laidback popsters from New Zealand. Winston Kingdom, 20.30, €12 Singer-songwriter: Darren Byrne Irish songwriter in an Irish bar. At various points in the past he’s played acid jazz, funky rock and traditional bluegrass. Tonight he drinks Guinness, vomits on the audience then falls off stage. Well, it is tourist season. Molly Malone's, 22.00, free Rock: El Rio Trio Rockabilly. Maloe Melo, 22.00, €5

Saturday 9 August Jazz: New Cotton Club All Stars Because the old All Stars couldn’t quite cut the rough-and-tumble Saturday afternoon jazz scene, here’s a more lively quartet.

Cotton Club, 16.30, free Singer-songwriter: Jenny Owen Youngs New Jersey acoustic songstress, who hit the ‘bigger’ time with the song ‘Fuck Was I’. See 3 Questions, p.13. Paradiso, Kleine Zaal, 20.00, €7.50 + membership

Must see: Reggae/Rock

Blk Jks Paradiso, Kleine Zaal, Thursday 7 August South African psychedelic dub rock with the kind of band name that makes editors weep. They’re hotly tipped and suitably slow and groovin’ for a steamy August night. 22.00, €9 + membership

Jazz: Ruben Hein Trio Double bill from the young pianist/singer and band. Concertgebouw, Koorzaal, 19.00, 21.00, €13.50 Jazz: Rosenberg Trio Gypsy jazz guitar songs. See Short List. Concertgebouw, Grote Zaal, 20.15, €22.50/€26.50

Rock ’n’ roll goodies: El Rio Trio pull all their rockabilly moves on Friday.

Jazz: Kim Sutherland All Stars Muziek, 21.30, free

Casablanca

Tuesday 12 August Rock: Drive-By Truckers Southern-style rootsy rock with a delightful modern twist. Becoming famous for their memorable live shows, the Truckers are starting to catch a little bit of the same recognition afforded to peers, My Morning Jacket.

Support from Cave Singers. Paradiso, Grote Zaal, 19.30, €16 + membership Rock: Lenny Kravitz Are you gonna go his way? Not unless you have tickets already. Anyway, his way ain’t our way. Heineken Music Hall, 19.30, sold out Pop/Rock: Witte Gei’t With sets from The Practicles and other singer-songwriters. De Nieuwe Anita, 20.00, free Contemporary: The Karnatic Lab A concert series devoted to exploring elements of Karnatic music from southern India and fusing them with jazz styles. Led by Ned McGowan and Gijs Levelt. Badcuyp, Noordpool, 20.30, free

Wednesday 13 August Classical: Liza Ferschtman The talented violinist is joined by friends and peers for chamber performances of Franck’s Piano Quintet in F and Brahms’ First String Sextet. Concertgebouw, Grote Zaal, 20.15, €17.50/€21

Amsterdam Weekly_7-13 August 2008

CLUBS

A G E N D A : C L U B S / G AY & L E S B I A N / S T A G E

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3 questions:

Jenny Owen Youngs Paradiso, Kleine Zaal, 9 August

Thursday 7 August Spin-Spin Sugar Urban hiphop, UK garage and R&B. Bitterzoet, 22.00-03.00, €7.50 Electrorated Hosted by Electronation, guess what kind of beats they’re spinning. Winston Kingdom, 23.00-03.00, €5 WKND Weekly bargain house party that’s never in your house. Studio 80, 23.00-late, €5 Noodlanding! Diverse pop, rock and dance tunes. In the basement, it’s Totaal Los with DJ RobotRock. Paradiso, 23.30-04.00, €8 Vreemd 2.0 A weird, weird summer night, with Melon inviting Tommy Kornuijt, Boris Werner, Zender and S_Loop. Sugar Factory, 23.59-05.00, €9

Friday 8 August Best of DUM DUM Four of Utrecht’s top DJs head to the Dam: Sjammie de Money, Etcenist, Illvester and Mike Mag. Bitterzoet, 22.00-04.00 Disco Exota Thirty-five years of club music in one night. At least, that’s what they put on the poster. What they don’t tell you is that the venue will be moving so fast inside, time will slow down, allowing Every Club Hit Ever to be played. That’s right: disco equals time travel.

Club 8, 22.00-04.00, free klinch: Rauw Rocking electro from Motor, LA Riots, Joost van Bellen and visuals from VJ 00KAAP. Melkweg, The Max, 23.00-late, €15 + membership

The young New Jersey singer-songwriter Jenny Owen Youngs was a student flute and tuba player before picking up the guitar at the tender age of 14. She self-released her first album, Batten the Hatches in 2005. It featured the song ‘Fuck Was I’ which appeared on the TV show Weeds. People listened and the album was re-released in 2007 and she’s been touring with her repertoire of heartfelt and feisty songs ever since. Citing influences ‘from Beck to Jesus Christ Superstar to Britney Spears’, she can be both a heart breaker and a tongue-in-cheeker. Check her out while she's still playing intimate places like the upstairs of Paradiso. It'll probably be your last chance.

Music for rocking? Antics by Interpol. For me, this album comes together just right. Every sound on the record is carefully architected and slotted together, from Paul Banks' unmistakable voice to the perfect guitar lines and pristine snare hits. The songs found here have even made things like romanticism and thoughtful prose rock again.

Music for mellowing? Pink Moon by Nick Drake. For a quiet, introspective listening experience, it's hard to go wrong with Nick. This album shows a master of interlacing delicate melodies and inventive guitar work at the very top of his game.

Music for loving? Portishead’s live album. A very sexy record from a very sexy band. If I say any more I'll embarrass myself.

Website: www.jennyowenyoungs.com

Playground presents Billy Dalessandro He’s the prince of Chicago house and techno, dontchaknow?

Studio 80, 23.00-late, €12 Boss Urban sounds from DJs Manga, Flava & SP, MC Lyrical Tie, VJ Nintando. Upstairs it’s DJs Melly Mel, Gomes, Steve, Boomselector & Mo MC. Paradiso, 23.59-05.00, €12.50 Discocult presents The First Lady OBT The First Lady of Bad Taste with supporting DJs including Rubedo, Graham B and VJ Martin Duvall. See Short List. Sugar Factory, 23.59-05.00, €10

GAY&LESBIAN Edited by Willem de Blaauw.

Saturday 9 August

Friday 8 August

Generations of Love Celebrating 20 years of house music at the beach. Dance, swim and booze to your heart’s content. Or possibly until your heart gives up.

Most of Amsterdam’s most popular DJs are represented across three stages. Blijburg, 11.00-00.00, €25

P.O.P. Pants Only Party at this new cool cruise club. No worries about what shirt to wear then.

Dance, flirt and do all kinds of other un-holy stuff.

Admission includes one drink and there’s even a tiny smokers’ lounge. Church, 20.00-00.00, €10

Fuck Yeah Here we fucking go again. More dance and rock madness. Club 8, 22.00-04.00, €7

Party: Women’s Night Weekly women’s night in this laid-back cafe, with either DJ Suna, Ortega, Roest or Voytec. Men are welcome, if accompanied by a female friend. Cafe Sappho, 21.00-01.00, free

ROCKIT & Vs Ensemble: 1+1=1 Two party organisers. Two locations (the second being Westerliefde).

One ticket. Electro and techno goodies. Westerunie, 22.00-04.00, €20 Struttin’ Raw funk and soul with some hiphop, reggae and beat flavourings. Bitterzoet, 22.00-04.00, €7.50 Barrio Mix Culture Night Dance night with DJs, live tunes and live painting. Cafe Pakhuis Wilhelmina, 22.00-late, €5 GirlsLoveDJs Show off DJs spin their fave tunes. A few have awful personal taste so they’ll fake it. Can you spot which in this new unofficial reality club concept? Hotel Arena, 23.00-04.00, €15 Bacardi B-Live The Mr Wix edition, with invited guests including Le Le, Scottie B, Daniel Haaksman featuring MC Gringo, Beesmunt Soundsystem and De Jeugd van Tegenwoordig, plus art and fashion by Parra, Vince and Blue Blood. Paradiso, 23.00-05.00, €15 Rebellion Tonight there’s gonna be a jailbreak, somewhere in this club. An electronic one, probably. So that’s okay. It’s an invisible crime. Studio 80, 23.00-late, €10

Sunday 10 August Wicked Jazz Sounds Jazz, hiphop, broken beats, nu-jazz, funk and Afro sounds, as classic vinyl collides with live musicians. Sugar Factory, 23.00-05.00, €9.50

over by a herd of happy homos who don’t mind swimming without their AussieBum, Speedo or Calvin Klein—or with the occasional woman. Het Marnix, 21.00-22.00, €3.50

Wednesday 13 August Happy hour: Fabulous Cocktail Night Luxury finger food, cocktails and champagne. Oh, and a fashionconscious crowd in the latest designer-wear, of course. All cocktails €5. Arc, 16.00-01.00, free Party: Like it or not Diva Mayday treats you to her favourite tunes at this super tiny cafe, plus some tasty free snacks. De Engel van Amsterdam, 19.00, free

STAGE

Party: (Z)onderbroek Drop your pants and dance in your most sexy briefs/Y-fronts/boxers or jockstrap at this men-only afternoon fun party. We love it here.

Different DJs spin wicked tunes, but if the heat on the tiny dancefloor gets too much, head to the smokers’ lounge for a ciggie or to the balcony for some relaxing action. Church, 16.00-20.00, €12

Monday 11 August Party: Blue Monday Alternative, non-scene, party, sometimes with live bands, for gays, lezzies, bisexuals and transgenders at this well-known squat. Vrankrijk, 22.00-02.00, free

Tuesday 12 August Sport: Nude Swimming Weekly nude-swimming hour, which is actually not gay but has been taken

Theatre: Zomergasten Every summer, theatre classics arrive in the open-air theatre at Amsterdamse Bos. This year it’s the turn of Maxim Gorky and his 1903 play Summerfolk, which is something of a commentary on the Russian bourgeoisie classes and the social and political changes occurring in that era. Michiel Bakker, Christine de Boer and Ian Bok star; direction by Frances Sanders. In Dutch.

Keep an eye on the weather forecast, as this can be rained off. Theater het Amsterdamse Bos, (Thur-Sat, Tues, Wed 21.30), €7.50/€10

Opening

Comedy: Comedytrain International Summer Festival English language stand-up over the weekend from Sean Collins (CAN) and Louis Katz (US).

From Wednesday, the line-up switches to Brit comedians Adam Bloom and Rhod Rhys. You can’t really go wrong with the CISF, but for more info about participants, see www.toomler.nl. Toomler, (Thur-Sat, Wed 20.30), €13.50

Music/Dance: Compañia Manuel Liñan A flamenco special with the group presenting Almalgama.

The music is by Antonia Jimenez and Arcadio Marin, with a clutch of talented dancers taking turns with Liñan. Concertgebouw, Grote Zaal, (Mon 20.15), €17.50/€21

Theatre: Terra: Extremitas—The End of the Earth London theatre collective Foolish People have collaborated with various NDSM-based artists for this multidisciplinary show about the future. They have set the Apocalypse to take place in the year 2012. Gulp.

See Short List. NDSM-werf, (Thur-Sun 20.00), €8

Saturday 9 August Hard On DJ Benjamin spins sexy dance tracks at this rubber/leather store. Browse, buy, mingle with the bad black-clad boys, pick up party flyers and relax in the garden. RoB, 15.00-18.00, free

Performance: The Great Flying Circus North Korea Though sadly not related to any Monty Pythons, these North Koreans still put on one hell of a circus show, which has won them the ‘Golden Clown’ at Monte Carlo’s circus festival eight times in a row. What’s more, flying commies always prevent any summer lull.

Carré, (Thur-Sat, Tues, Wed 20.00, Sun 19.00, Sat, Sun also 14.00), €15-€49

Ongoing Comedy: Boom Chicago There’s no summer stop on Leidseplein. See www.boomchicago.nl and take your pick from climate change comedy Last One to Leave the Planet, Turn Off the Lights! or Best of Boom 2008. And in the whole of August, you can even get €5 off the ticket price by saying—sincerely—‘I love George Bush.’ Boom Chicago, (Daily), €20/€24 Comedy: Stand-Up Comedy Show Weekly stand-up that’s primarily in Dutch. But some international guests do perform in English. Comedy Cafe, (Thur-Sat 21.00, Sat also 23.30), €16

Skinnydipping: Peel off on Tuesdays at Het Marnix. You needn’t be gay or lesbian to float freely.

Comedy: International Comedy The Comedy Theater turns cosmopolitan for the summer, with the joke preference switching to English to accommodate tourists and those left to work through the tropical months. Look out for international acts taking to the stage each weekend. Comedy Theater, (Fri, Sat 20.30), €12.50 Comedy: Burlesque FreakOut A weekly party where fetish meets vaudeville and glamour meets sleaze, falling somewhere between Moulin Rouge and a Tarantino movie. Featuring dancers and performers from around the world. Comedy Theater, (Sat 23.00), €12.50 Comedy: Hole in the Boat New, and English-spoken, comedy improv duo. Comedy Cafe, (Sun 21.00), €13

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Amsterdam Weekly_7-13 August 2008

AGENDA: EVENTS/ART Maybe see: Conference

Gay Games Amsterdam 1998—10 jaar later Ten years of the Gay Games in Amsterdam. Centrale Bibliotheek (Daily), opens Friday, until 8 October Naturellement Diverse works by 19 young and talented artists. Walls Gallery (Wed-Sun 12.00-17.00), opens Sunday, until 12 September

Museums Olaf Klijn Twenty-three photos from the book Architectuur & Wonen in Broek in Waterland. ARCAM (Tues-Sat 13.00-17.00), closing Saturday Green Bags: Brand New and Used Materials Showcasing bags and designers embracing the concepts of recyclable and sustainable. Museum of Bags and Purses (Daily 10.00-17.00), until 17 August The Transitory World of Horst Janssen An exhibition of works by the German graphic artist Horst Janssen (1929-1995). In Germany he is regarded as one of the greatest post-war artists, although, strangely enough, he is far less well-known outside Germany. This is the first showing of his prints in the Netherlands. Rembrandthuis (Mon-Sat 10.00-17.00, Sun 11.00-17.00), until 24 August Images of St Petersburg In the 19th century in Russia, as elsewhere, photography revolutionised the recording of everyday reality. The palaces, new buildings, inhabitants and important events were captured by many Russian and foreign photographers. This summer exhibition features almost 100 such examples from the period. Hermitage Amsterdam (Daily 10.00-17.00), until 24 August Cary Grant Original screen-printed posters, photos, film compilations and a documentary, which accompany the Cary Grant film series throughout July and August. Filmmuseum (Mon-Fri 09.00 -22.15, Sat, Sun one hour prior to show-22.15), until 27 August

Tackle Trade World Fair RAI, Saturday 9 August to Monday 11 August The whole world’s coming apparently. And if this had fallen sweetly in with our gay pride issue, the jokes would have been spurting out in all angles. Instead, we’ll have to get serious about angling, as this expo features 130 major players from the global tackle industry, which is sure to help you dangle something big and salty, ensuring you make a great catch down at your local park. Ah, what could have been... (Sat, Sun 10.00-18.00, Mon 10.00-16.00), free

EVENTS Festival: De Parade No better place to hang out on a zwoele summer evening than De Parade, now celebrating its 18th anniversary in a park-like setting near the Amstel. This fortnight of a circus-like, funfair theatre and music fest has grown over the years, but it remains a great place to settle down with a beer, gelato or an organic fruit juice cocktail while the sun slowly sets over the swinging merry-goround. There’s oodles of original performances by up-and-coming acts, many of which are in Dutch, but there’s also plenty to amuse English-only speakers. Until 19 August. See www.deparade.nl. Martin Luther Kingpark, (Sun-Thur 15.00-01.00, Fri, Sat 15.00-02.00), €6 + variable performance costs Music: Dansen en Zingen Karaoke and carry okay?

Casablanca Muziek, (Thur 22.00, Fri, Sat 20.00, Wed 23.00), free Performance: Vondelpark Openluchttheater Summer fun in Vondelpark. Thursday brings classical music, Friday means dance performances, Saturdays are a mixed bag of theatre, cabaret and pop, and Sundays are filled with singer-songwriter musical sets.

This week’s special is a salsa roller disco on Sunday afternoon. Sounds dangerous. See www.openluchttheater.nl. Vondelpark Openluchttheater, (Thur, Fri, Sat 20.30, Sat, Sun 14.00), free Festival: Summer Darkness Billed as an ‘underground lifestyle event’, this could mean a lot of things. But judging from the line-up—and its official

status as the meeting point for ‘European vampire freaks’—it’s safe to expect lots of goth kids, teenage witches and mostly straight men wearing shiny black leather. Good times, as far as we’re concerned. Sun tans are for idiots. See www.summerdarkness.nl for the full darkened whack. Various locations, Utrecht, (Thur-Sun), various prices Performance: Artis ZOOmeravond Summer sees Artis keeping its doors open during Saturday evenings.

Tonight’s special guests are Duo Lekker Belangrijk, theatre group Omega, DuaCappella, plus a puppet show.

As always, animal experts will be on hand to chat about their specialist topics. Artis, (Sat 19.00), zoo entry cost Tour: Rijksmuseum Renovation Fancy a peak behind the scenes of the Rijksmuseum renovations in the Cuypers building? Special weekend tours are occurring throughout August, allowing access to many of those areas the public has been omitted from in recent times. It’s a very limited offer and great if you’re into the museum or architecture in general. Rijksmuseum, (Sat, Sun 12.00-16.00), free

ART Opening Rogier Verkade: Recht in Beeld Triptych photo sets; two of the photos are Creative Commons licensed images from sites like Flickr, with Verkade creating a third image to complete the trio. Centrale Bibliotheek (Daily), opens Thursday, until 28 September

Rijksmuseum Renovation tours: More interesting than The Night Watch.

Amsterdam and the House of Orange An exhibition surveying the ties which have bound Amsterdam and the House of Orange over the centuries. Amsterdams Historisch Museum (Mon-Fri 10.00-17.00, Sat, Sun 11.00-17.00), until 31 August Wim van der Linden Photography of Amsterdam from the ’60s. Stadsarchief Amsterdam (Tues-Sat 10.00-17.00, Sun 11.00-17.00), until 31 August Hans Scholten: Urban future ‘The future of the city’ is the theme raised by Amsterdam artist Scholten (1952) in this photographic project. For a number of years he has been photographing the urban landscapes of huge cities in Asia and the Middle East. There he captures scenes of rapidly growing neighbourhoods, in which chaos and anarchy seem to arise due to a lack of organised city planning. Is this the future that awaits cities in the Western world as well? Huis Marseille (Tues-Sun 11.00-18.00), until 31 August Domingo Milella: Paesaggi The past six years, Milella has concentrated on an ongoing project, which takes as it’s central focus the postmodern landscape, from dwellings to urban periphery. His perspectives offers us a fresh interpretation of the changing face of our surroundings. Foam (Sat-Wed 10.00-18.00, Thur, Fri 10.00-21.00), until 31 August Anne Frank—A History for Today Travelling exhibition about the life of Frank, set against the background of the persecution of the Jews during WII. Featured are family photos and an overview of the books she read while in hiding. Centrale Bibliotheek (Daily), until 31 August Lectori Salutem Delving into the history of books, with original objects, beautiful manuscripts and books from Dutch collections, photographs and texts. Allard Pierson Museum (Tues-Fri 10.00-17.00, Sat, Sun 13.0017.00), until 7 September Marc Camille Chaimowicz: ...In The Cherished Company of Others... One hundred works by Chaimowicz, including drawings, decorative and functional objects, wallpapers, maquettes, sculptures, paintings and a revisited installation. These sit alongside architectural models, bookplates and artworks by other international artists with whom the artist feels empathy with. De Appel (Tues-Sun 11.00-18.00), until 7 September The Shadow Cabinet: No More Reality.Step 3: SHARED FOLDER Video and audio installations, screenings, magazines, books, newspapers, posters and leaflets. De Appel (Tues-Sun 11.00-18.00), until 7 September Beyond Paradise Group exhibition which highlights the interaction between tourism and contemporary art. This includes travel brochures, postcards, advertisements, films and so on. Artists include Bik van der

Amsterdam Weekly_7-13 August 2008

Pol, Patricia Esquives, Arnout Killian and more. See Short List. Stedelijk Museum Bureau Amsterdam (Tues-Sun 11.00-17.00), until 7 September

AGENDA: ART Opening: Paraat #4

schedule see www.petersburgprojectspace.org.

Petersburg Project Space (Daily, evenings till 01.00), until 29 August

Kors van Bennekom—Kors’s Choice An exhibition celebrating the 75th birthday of the Amsterdam photographer Kor van Bennekom, the street photographer, theatre photographer and family photographer, whose remarkable oeuvre reflects the history of the Netherlands in the second half of the 20th century. Foam (Sat-Wed 10.00-18.00, Thur, Fri 10.00-21.00), until 14 September

Ata & Eva An overview exhibition of the oeuvre of Hungarian photographers Ata Kandó (1913) and Eva Besnyö (1910-2003). Hup Gallery (Tues, Thur, Fri 10.00-17.00), until 30 August Dutch Nudes Dutch photography, encouraging models to get their kit off. Blow Up Gallery (ThurSat13.00-18.00), until 30 August Arabic Graphics Exhibition showcasing the graphic and typographic design works of Lebanese-Dutch designer Tarek Atrissi, who has developed ideas for commercial and non-commercial projects around the world. De Levante (Wed-Sun 13.00-17.30), until 31 August

Me! Me! Me! An interactive exhibition that touches on self representation on the internet and fashion, on the far reaching consequences of modern communication and on our self image and the way we experience the world around us. The exhibition also highlights our own cultural potential with a minimal ecological footprint. In the process, art and fashion activists Andrea Crews will transform Mediamatic’s new location into a world fashion centre. Mediamatic Tues-Sat 11.0017.00, Sun 12.00-17.00, until 14 September

Summer in the City Photo exhibition from four established snappers: Anne Marie Trovato, Reinier Gerritsen, Martijn de Jonge and Alex ten Napel.

Melkweg Galerie (Tues-Sat 13.00 -18.00), until 31 August

NL28 Olympic Fire An exhibition in which scale models, film, debate and theatre help visitors to imagine that the Netherlands is organising the Olympic Games in 2028, a century after the Games in Amsterdam. Nederlands Architectuurinstituut (Tues-Sat 10.00-17.00, Sun 11.00-17.00), Rotterdam, until 21 September

I Pity Inanimate Objects Freaky sculptures and installations by Jaap de Vries. Planetart (see www.planetart.nl), until 31 August Pink with Pride Six galleries in the Jordaan link hands and pull out their pinkest art of the year. GO Gallery exhibits work from Marc de Vries, Juan Carlos Tajes, Yvonne Zomerdijk, Fred, Karol Bak, James Davidson and Rinaldo Hopf. While Galerie Buuf boasts the photography of Rotterdammer Wim de Roo, images from Patrice de Schaetzen and paintings from Yvonne Boelens. Other galleries involved are Galerie KochxBos, Apart, Galerie George Cent and Rock Archive. A great break from all the loud festivities, this offers loud and lovely feasts for the eyes. Various locations, Jordaan various times, until 31 August

Gewoon Anders! Exhibition revolving around alternative sexual lifestyles which, during the turn of the 21st century, spawned a wealth of images. With over 100 pieces by some 35 artists, including Gilbert & George, Nan Goldin, Marlene Dumas, Wolfgang Tillmans, Marlene McCarty, Rachid Ben Ali and a nine-metre high monumental statue of David, in bright pink and canary yellow, by Hans-Peter Feldmann. CoBrA Museum (Tues-Sun 11.00-17.00), until 21 September Deep Screen—Art in Digital Culture Contemporary multidisciplinary works of art which are all in some way marked by today’s digital culture. The jury, chaired by guest curator Andreas Broeckmann, has selected 18 artists out of the 200-plus submissions. Stedelijk Museum CS (Daily 10.00 -18.00), until 30 September Snap Judgments—New Positions in Contemporary African Photography An exhibition of work by 35 contemporary African artists and photographers with unique perspectives on their own continent. It reveals how artists are using photography to respond artistically to the enormous changes currently taking place in African economic, social and cultural life, but the artists also break away from lingering stereotypical images of their cultures, histories and countries. Stedelijk Museum CS (Daily 10.00-18.00), until 30 September De Kabbala—Graven van Safed Photos of the cemetery in the Israeli city of Safed. Nederlands Uitvaart Museum Tot Zover (Mon-Fri 13.00-17.00), until 12 October ‘Druksel prints’ by Werkman A presentation by the Stedelijk Museum dedicated to the ‘druksel prints’ of Hendrik Werkman, who, in the ’20s, developed the technique of printing parts of a print one at a time to compile the total image on a page. Van Gogh Museum (Mon-Thur, Sat, Sun 10.00-18.00, Fri 10.00-22.00), until 12 October Malick Sidibé Malian photographer (b. 1935, Soloba) who, from the early ’60s on, snapped portraits and various engagements of local society, from football matches to weddings and Christmas Eve celebrations, which now offer insight into the people’s lives shortly after winning their independence. Sidibé was one of the first African photographers to gain recognition in the West. Foam (Sat-Wed 10.00-18.00, Thur, Fri 10.0021.00), until 15 October Black is Beautiful A journey of discovery though the history of art, which for the first time aims to highlight the attractiveness of the black person in the art of the Lowlands. It turns out, many great masters have portrayed black people. Their fascination will be illustrated in 135 paintings, drawings and manuscripts from collections here and abroad, including artists like Rembrandt, Breitner, Sluijters, Appel and Dumas.

Nieuwe Kerk (Fri-Wed 10.00-18.00, Thur 10.00-22.00), until 26 October 24-hour Indonesia Glimpse the daily life of contemporary Indonesia. Eight different crews across Indonesia filmed during a 24-hour period. Tropenmuseum (Daily 10.00-17.00), until 16 November Atlas Maior. De wereld van Blaeu Exquisite examples of Joan Blaeu’s maps, made in Amsterdam’s Golden Era, when the industry of cartography was in full bloom. UvA: Special Collections Library (Mon-Fri 10.00-17.00, Sat, Sun 13.00-17.00), until 23 November

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Happy to Be A group exhibition by ten gay and lesbian artists, featuring photography, paintings and sculptures. ABC Treehouse (Thur-Sun 13.00-18.00), until 31 August

Paraat #4 Various locations, opens Sunday 9 August, until 30 August A collaboration between De Veemvloer and Ronmandos, showcasing the end exam works of talented (now ex) students from around the country. Works range from paintings to multimedia and installations. (De Veemvloer: Wed-Sat 13.00-18.00, Sun 15.00-18.00; Ronmandos: Wed-Sat 12.00-18.00)

Art of the State Photographs and video works by sixteen artists from Israel. Through their works they reflect upon their country: the community in which they live, the numerous cultural and religious differences among Israel’s population and the current political situation. Joods Historisch Museum (Daily 11.00-17.00), until 30 November Hendrik Werkman: The Blue Barge Exhibition containing Werkman’s preparatory studies for the suites of prints he made as an act of resistance for The Blue Barge during WWII. The most famous of these is Chassidische Legenden. Joods Historisch Museum (Daily 11.00-17.00), until 30 November

Thijs Gadiot and Frank Mandersloot. W139 (Sun-Thur 11.00-20.00, Fri, Sat 11.00-22.00), until 17 August Free and Untamed Beings Six ambitious artists and designers get fashionistic for a month. The participants are: Meredith farmers, Claire Fons, Py Tswang jin, Jessie Mak, Niki Mens, Quoc Thang and Jenske Dijkhuis. Arguably, if they were more ambitious they’d be in a more commercial gallery, but this place is great. De Service Garage (Wed-Sun 13.00-18.00), until 18 August

Frans Westers Oil paintings with themes such as human nature, mother & child and young children as fairy tale figures. Maybe if you ask, you can see all the artist’s darker, more cynical works round the back of the gallery. Galerie Jos Art (Wed-Sun 11.00-17.30, Sat, Sun 11.00-17.30), until 3 September Walking in Rome with Bernini, Michelangelo and Leonardo Retrospective of Italian artist Mario Padovan’s work in Rome from 1963-1997. Paule Carre (Mon 13.00-18.00; Tue, Wed, Fri 10.00-18.00; Thur 10.00-20.00; Sat 10.00-17.00), until 10 September

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Stacked and Scattered Diverse works by George Korsmit, Federico Campanale, Constant Dullaart, Frank Mandersloot, Henny van Overbeek, Boris Tellegen and Nico W Jungmann. W139 (Sun-Thur 11.00-20.00, Fri, Sat 11.00-22.00), until 17 August

El blanco perfecto Paintings and installations that explore Dominican artist Miguel Rivas’s relationship with femininity. CEDLA (Mon-Fri 10.00-17.00), until 28 August

See Thursday 1. Celine Cairo - ‘Thinking’ 2. Blk Jks - ‘Lakeside’ See Friday 3. Jayson Norris - ‘Superhero’ 4. The War on Drugs - ‘Taking the Farm’ 5. Rosenberg Trio - ‘Minor Blues’ 6. El Rio Trio - ‘Hit Me’ See Saturday 7. Jenny Owen Youngs - ‘Fuck Was I’ 8. De Jeugd van Tegenwoordig ‘Watskeburt?’

See Sunday 9. Maxïmo Park - ‘Girls Who Play Guitar’ 10. Rik van den Bosch - ‘Flyin’ Airplane Blues’ See Tuesday 11. Drive-By Truckers - ‘Three Dimes Down’ 12. The Practicles - ‘My River’

Stacked and Scattered Diverse works by George Korsmit, Federico Campanale, Constant Dullaart, Henny Overbeek, Boris Tellegen, Nico Jungmann,

Videozomer Diverse works by video artists, which can be viewed from outside of the project space. A new artist is screened each week until 29 August. For

Uploaded every Wednesday. For more info see listings and weekly blog.

Galleries Raymond Cuijpers An exhibition dominated by football by a footballer turned artist. Van Zijll Langhout (Mon-Fri 11.00-17.00), until 15 August Paul Blanca: Mi Matties & Kristal Two new black-and-white photo series: one focussed on street children, the other a naked model submerged in chocolate and displayed like confectionery. Witzenhausen Gallery (Thur-Sat 12.00-18.00), until 16 August New Geographies A new media mapping exhibition that aims to show a visible path of personal migrations. Imagine IC (Tues, Wed, Fri, Sat 11.00-17.00, Thur 11.00-21.00), until 17 August

Uninspired? More art listings at www.amsterdamweekly.nl/art

Finnish Bitches Jewellery by Eija Mustonen, Helena Lehtinen, Tarja Lehtinen, Tarja Tuupanen, Anna Rikkinen, Terhi Tolvanen and Janna Syvanoja. Finnish bitches, indeed. Galerie Louise Smit (Wed-Fri 14.0018.00, Sat 13.00-17.00), until 21 August Summer exhibitions Paintings of palaces, castles and grand estates. What more do you expect midsummer? De Kunstfabriek Tues-Fri 12.00-18.00, Sat, Sun 12.00-17.00, until 22 August Eindexamenexpositie voorjaar 2008 Graduating photo students present their works. Fotogram (MonThur 09.30-21.00, Fri, Sat 09.30-17.00), until 23 August Checking Reality Envision the world as a computer game in which your clothes are 3D-projections and a GPS system tells you the position of an object. Imagine yourself as an avatar, flying through future cities and simulated landscapes. This exhibition poses such a virtual world in the real world. Platform 21 (Thur-Sun 12.00-18.00), until 27 August

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Amsterdam Weekly_7-13 August 2008

AGENDA: ADDRESSES Lekker Bezig

By Luuk van Huët

Nicolette Aschermann, chocolateer ‘I’m the proud owner of the one and only Chocomobiel, a portable party experience! After working in publicity and marketing for theatres, festivals and agents for a couple of years, I decided to start my own business in 2005, partly because I wanted to work my own hours. I went on an inspirational trip to New York and discovered that chocolate fondues were the big thing there. It triggered fond memories of my father whisking me away for my 16th birthday to a London restaurant that specialised in desserts. I added my love of acting out a certain character, which I did during my studies, and had my Chocomobiel built. The first try-out was in the living room of a friend, but it has grown to two to four gigs a month all over the Netherlands.

‘It livens up any party by combining entertainment, a special sight, delicious snacks and my own mood-enhancing performance as singer/MC Marie Cortez.

‘My most memorable gigs included a party for cabin personnel from a major airline. Everybody was watching his or her figure, so nobody ate anything. Another was completely the opposite: it was a huge party with 2000 tipsy women who work in child care. They licked the entire Chocomobiel clean in one-and-a-half-hours.

‘Besides the Chocomobiel, I have a company called Creative Vibes in which I host events acting as former talk show host Geeske Borst, her flamboyant sister Sjarmantha or folksy Joyce from the Jordaan.’

ADDRESSES 11 Oosterdokskade 3-5, 625 5999 ABC Treehouse Voetboogstraat 11, 423 0967 Allard Pierson Museum Oude Turfmarkt 127, 525 2556 Amsterdams Historisch Museum Kalverstraat 92, 523 1822 De Appel Nieuwe Spiegelstraat 10, 625 5651 Arc Reguliersdwarsstraat 44, 689 7070 ARCAM Prins Hendrikkade 600, 620 4878 Artis Plantage Kerklaan 38-40, 523 3400

Photo by Joost Benthem

Dip in at: www.creativevibes.nl

Fotogram Korte Prinsengracht 33, 624 9994

Paradiso Weteringschans 6-8, 626 4521

Galerie Jos Art KSNM-laan 291, 418 7003

Paule Carre Cornelis Schuytstraat 44, 675 6800

Galerie Louise Smit Prinsengracht 615, 625 9898

Petersburg Project Space Frans de Wollantstraat 84

Heineken Music Hall ArenA Boulevard 590,

Planetart Weteringschans 179

0900 300 1250

Platform 21 Prinses Irenestraat 19, 344 9449

Hermitage Amsterdam Nieuwe Herengracht 14, 530 8751

PRIK Spuistraat 109, 06 4544 2321

Hotel Arena ’s-Gravesandestraat 51, 850 2400

RAI Europaplein 22, 549 1212

Huis Marseille Keizersgracht 401, 531 8989

Rembrandthuis Jodenbreestraat 4, 520 0400

Hup Gallery Tesselschadestraat 15, 515 8589

Rijksmuseum Jan Luykenstraat 1, 674 7000

Imagine IC Bijlmerplein 1006-1008, 489 4866

RoB Warmoesstraat 71

Joods Historisch Museum Jonas Daniel Meijerplein 2-4,

De Service Garage Stephensonstraat 16

Badcuyp 1e Sweelinckstraat 10, 675 9669

531 0310

Skek Zeedijk 4-8, 427 0551

Bijbels Museum Herengracht 366-368, 624 2436

KHL Koffiehuis Oostelijke Handelskade 44, 779 1575

Stadsarchief Amsterdam Vijzelstraat 32

Bitterzoet Spuistraat 2, 521 3001

De Kunstfabriek Polonceaukade 20

Stedelijk Museum Bureau Amsterdam Rozenstraat 59,

Blijburg Bert Haanstrakade 2004, 416 0330

(Westergasfabriekterrein), 488 9430

422 0471

Blow Up Gallery Hazenstraat 67, 665 3435

De Levante Hobbemastraat 28, 671 5485

Stedelijk Museum CS Oosterdokskade 5, 573 2911

Boom Chicago Leidseplein 12, 530 7300

Maloe Melo Lijnbaansgracht 163, 420 4592

Studio 80 Rembrandtplein 17, 521 8333

Bourbon Street Leidsekruisstraat 6-8, 623 3440

Het Marnix Marnixplein 1, 5246000

Studio K Timorplein 62, 692 0422

Cafe Pakhuis Wilhelmina Veemkade 576, 419 3368

Mediamatic Vijzelstraat 68, 638 9901

Sugar Factory Lijnbaansgracht 238, 627 0008

Cafe Sappho Vijzelstraat 103, 423 1509

Melkweg Galerie Marnixstraat 409, 531 8181

Theater het Amsterdamse Bos Amsterdamse Bos 1,

Carré Amstel 115-125, 524 9452

Melkweg Lijnbaansgracht 234a

640 9253

Casablanca Muziek Zeedijk 26, 06 1220 0519

Molly Malone's Oudezijds Kolk 9, 624 1150

Toomler Breitnerstraat 2, 670 7400

CEDLA Keizersgracht 395-397, 525 3498

Museum Het Schip Spaarndammerplantsoen 140,

Tropenmuseum Linnaeusstraat 2, 568 8200

Centrale Bibliotheek Oosterdokskade 143, 523 0900

418 2885

UvA: Special Collections Library Oude Turfmarkt 129,

Church Kerkstraat 50-52

Museum of Bags and Purses Herengracht 573, 524 6452

525 2141

Club 8 Admiraal de Ruyterweg 56B, 685 1703

NDSM-werf TT Neveritaweg 15, 330 5480

Van Gogh Museum Paulus Potterstraat 7, 570 5200

CoBrA Museum Sandbergplein 1-3, Amstelveen, 547 5050

Nederlands Architectuurinstituut Museumpark 25,

Van Zijll Langhout Brouwersgracht 161, 06 2825 9620

Comedy Cafe Max Euweplein 43-45, 638 3971

Rotterdam, 010 440 1200

Verzetsmuseum Plantage Kerklaan 61, 620 2535

Comedy Theater Nes 110, 422 2777

Nederlands Fotomuseum Wilhelminakade 332,

Vondelpark Openluchttheater, 673 1499

Concertgebouw Concertgebouwplein 2-6, 671 8345

Rotterdam, 010 213 2011

Vrankrijk Spuistraat 216

Consortium Veemkade 570, 06 2611 8950

Nederlands Uitvaart Museum Tot Zover Kruislaan 124,

W139 Warmoesstraat 139, 622 9434

Cotton Club Nieuwmarkt 5, 626 6192

694 0482

Walls Gallery Prinsengracht 737

De Engel van Amsterdam Zeedijk 21, 427 6381

De Nieuwe Anita Frederik Hendrikstraat 111, 06 4150 3512

Westergasfabriek Haarlemmerweg 8-10, 586 0710

Filmmuseum Vondelpark 3, 589 1400

Nieuwe Kerk entrance on the Dam, 638 6909

Westerunie Klönneplein 4-6

Flex Bar Pazzanistraat 1, 486 2123

OCCII Amstelveenseweg 134, 671 7778

Winston Kingdom Warmoesstraat 129, 623 1380

Foam Keizersgracht 609, 551 6546

Pacific Parc Polonceaukade 23, 488 7778

Witzenhausen Gallery Elandsstraat 145, 644 9898

No really. You should listen to the weekly mixtape at amsterdamweekly.muxtape.com

Amsterdam Weekly_7-13 August 2008

AGENDA: FILM

Film review

By Kate Eaton

Mataharis Opens Thursday at Het Ketelhuis

THIS AIN’T NO CHARLIE’S ANGELS A film about an all-female detective agency is both dramatic and realistic.

‘Mata Hari’, the name taken by the Dutch courtesan who was executed in Paris as a spy, is Malaysian for ‘eye of the day’, or ‘sun’. In Iciar Bollain’s Mataharis, the sun beats down on office blocks, highways and the busy streets of a metropolis full of

FILM Amsterdam Weekly recommends.

Festivals Pluk de Nacht Fresh films under the stars in the fifth edition of the biggest outdoor series in Amsterdam.

This year the programme runs for its first week at the Stenen Hoofd and its second on the Timorplein next to Studio K. Films this week include the New Zealand thriller In My Father’s Den, the unconventional Estonian father-son drama Magnus, and Victor Kosakovsky’s legendary 1993 documentary Belovy, which follows an embittered brother and sister through the trials of postCommunist Russia. Pluk de Nacht Open-Air Cinema

Open Air The Commitments Based on Roddy Doyle’s novel about a young white soul band in Dublin, Alan Parker’s 1991 film harks back in some ways to the youthful energies of his Fame, though happily without the melodrama. The interactions of the ten-member group—including three female backup singers and an older sax player who romances them in turn while serving as the group’s guru—and the

people in a hurry. Handheld cameras bring the city, anonymous at first, to life in documentary style, colouring it orange, dusty and fast. When you look more closely, at the shops, the street signs and the billboards in Spanish, you see that the film

numbers themselves form the main bill of fare. Lively and fun to watch. (JR) 116 min. Cavia Open-Air Cinema

Nachtrit Cool film about a taxi driver who gets caught up in the Amsterdam taxi war of 2000. Dennis (Frank Lammers) takes on a huge debt to finance his own taxi permit. Little does he know that a new law is about to come through that will make his permit absolutely worthless. With good acting, great dialogues and a convincing sex scene, the film makes perfect use of the darker side of the city. In Dutch. (LG) 104 min. Filmmuseum Open Air The Squid and the Whale With this 2005 autobiographical drama, Noah Baumbach delivers a witty, insightful and highly recognisable peek inside the phenomenon called divorce. The screenplay is so spot on, it feels like déjà vu. The acting is impressive: Laura Linney, as the wife and mother of two teenage sons, is so dependably good we almost take it for granted, and Owen Kline (yes, the son of Kevin Kline and Phoebe Cates) is a natural in his first major outing. Jesse Eisenberg faces the biggest challenge as 16-year-old Walt, whose hostility towards his mother barely disguises his own insecurities. And who would have thought that Jeff ‘Dumb & Dumber’ Daniels could play such a convincing asshole? A must-see. (BS) Pluk de Nacht Open-Air Cinema

New this week CineacT Cineac is back! The anti-squat team in the venerable cinema, across from Tuschinski, have plans to host a number of special screenings. Thursday’s programme features a presentation on the work of Cineac’s

Web tip:

Eddie Izzard – Stoned Olympics http://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=M5X-9brvoq0

is shot in Madrid. But it’s a Madrid that tourists would hardly discover on their own.

Drawing inspiration from a newspaper article about a Chinese detective agency run by female sleuths, writerdirector Bollain (Take My Eyes, Flowers from Another World) and co-writer Tatiana Rodriguez did some investigating of their own. Over a four-month period they looked into the lives and skills of female detectives, their cases and investigation methods. They came out with Mataharis, a film that highlights the intertwining stories of three women of different generations, all employed by the profit-driven agency Valbuena Detectives.

Their boss is the unscrupulous Valbuena (Fernando Cayo), and their cases vary from uncovering corporate dirty tricks and catching adulterers to locating an old man’s first sweetheart. Detective work loses its Hollywood excitement and becomes just another job, really.

The youngest detective at the agency is the ambitious and single Ines (Maria Vazquez), who has just graduated from university and can’t wait to up her career a notch. A challenging but seemingly straightforward assignment to go undercover as a cleaner in a multinational, in order to investigate company property theft by two mid-level managers, turns out to be less clear-cut than she’d assumed. Conflicting interests lead Ines to seriously consider what she’s willing to do to further her career.

architect, Johannes Duiker; an edition of Sprocket Sounds featuring midcentury Dutch, English and German newsreels (Cineac was built as a newsreel cinema in 1934); and several more shorts, including dance films, work by the Brothers Quay and a newsreel compilation by the legendary artist Joseph Cornell. Cineac Fireflies in the Garden A superb cast is wasted in this yarn about a dysfunctional Midwestern family. Willem Dafoe is a college professor, married to Julia Roberts.

On their way to her late-in-life graduation ceremony they get into a car accident, and tragedy tears the family apart. During the mourning period, tension hangs in the air, revelations about an abusive past approach and flashbacks abound. The professor’s son Michael (Ryan Reynolds) has just completed an autobiographical novel. When, in an overly dramatic sequence, he throws his manuscript into the fire, we secretly wish the producers had done the same with the script. Written and directed by Dennis Lee; with Emily Watson and CarrieAnne Moss. (MB) The Movies, Pathé Tuschinski

Mataharis Three women work at a seedy detective agency in the latest from Icíar Bollaín (Take My Eyes). See review above. In Spanish with Dutch subtitles. Het Ketelhuis Small Gods This 2007 debut feature by Belgian director Dimitri Karakatsanis was influenced by Tarkovsky, Takeshi Kitano and Terence Malick (Badlands) and was described by Humo magazine as a cross between ‘a surrealistic road movie and a mad drug dream’.

Showing in the Previously Unreleased series. In Dutch.

90 min. Filmmuseum The X-Files: I Want to Believe The second big-screen spin-off of the cult TV show is a ‘standalone’ that nonfans can follow without knowing the series’ fiendishly complicated backstory. The problem is that only a fan would be inclined to tolerate this dunderheaded mystery, in which the FBI recruits former agents Mulder (David Duchovny) and Scully (Gillian Anderson) to help find a missing woman. In addition to the usual paranormal stuff, writer-director Chris Carter has added some canned Catholicism: clues arrive in the visions of a wiggy pedophile priest (Billy Connolly), and in a groaner of a subplot, Dr Scully, now employed as a surgeon, struggles to save a dying boy whose only hope is a radical new treatment and a whole lot of faith. (JJ) 104 min.

Pathé ArenA, Pathé De Munt You Don’t Mess With the Zohan A battle-fatigued Israeli commando gives himself a makeover, assuming

The X-Files: I really want to believe it’s good, but it’s a struggle.

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Pretty Eva (Najwa Nimri) is a young mother of two, just back at the agency after her maternity leave and desperately trying to juggle work and family with the help of her less than competent husband Inaki (Tristan Ulloa). When Eva suspects Inaki of keeping a secret from her, she applies her professional skills, without much soul-searching, to find out more about his private life. The results of her quest, however, lead to a crisis in their marriage.

Carmen (Nuria Gonzalez of Pudor) is in her early fifties and by far the most experienced and competent detective.

Her discoveries as a sleuth hardly make her bat an eyelid, but the plight of a cuckolded husband does make her painfully aware of the indifference of her own husband of many years.

Bollain has managed to paint realistic and warm portraits of working women in modern society. Each of the female detectives in Mataharis has her own charm, but all of them are real women—overbites, underbites, bumpy noses and all. It is easy for women to identify with the flawed heroines who, in the course of their work, make discoveries about themselves and their lives. Mataharis is subtle but no less compelling than any regular whodunit. Will these women sell out? Will they call the kettle black? Will a comatose marriage be revived with the help of lovers and lingerie? The empowering choices they eventually make inspire a hearty ‘good for you, girl’. ___

a new identity as a New York hairstylist. That’s more high-concept than most Adam Sandler comedies, with the star creating a distinctive character amid all the meshugas. Though a bunch of the jokes are milked too thin, there are some absurdly goofy sight gags—like a hacky sack game enlisting a family pet—and a lineup of fun, silly cameos by guests from Chris Rock to Mariah Carey. John Turturro and Rob Schneider play the hero’s inept Arab nemeses, but skinheads and greedy tycoons are the ones who really get bashed in this lightweight amiable parody. Sandler cowrote the screenplay with Robert Smigel and Judd Apatow, and Dennis Dugan directed. (AG) 113 min. Pathé ArenA, Pathé De Munt

Still playing 21: Las Vegas Kevin Spacey is an MIT mathematics professor who recruits five of his students to run a card-counting operation and win millions at the casinos. Spacey, playing a heartless prick, is about the only good thing going for this blandly written film. (JJ) 123 min. Pathé De Munt 4 maanden, 3 weken en 2 dagen Romanian cinema seems to have found a niche for sober, socially committed dramas. After The Death of Mr Lazarescu (the failing health care system) and 12:08 East of Bucharest (the revolution of 1989), Cristian Mungiu’s 4 months, 3 weeks and 2 days focuses on the ban on abortion under Ceaucescu. Student Otilia agrees to help her roommate Gabita with the preparations for an illegal termination of her pregnancy. But to see 4, 3, 2 only as an anti-abortion film would be to miss the point. Their act is merely the tool with which the two women’s friendship is tested and proven. The film won this year’s Palme d’Or in Cannes. In Romanian with Dutch subtitles. (BS) The Movies ABBA, The Movie The Swedish pop quartet tours Australia in this 1977 documentary, an early effort by film-maker Lasse Hallstrom (The Cider House Rules, Chocolat). Today’s screening is a restored version of the original. 97 min. Pathé Tuschinski Adam’s Apples Directed by Anders Thomas Jensen, who might be the hottest thing from Denmark since certain cartoons, this black comedy stars Mads Mikkelsen, ‘the Danish Johnny Depp’, as Ivan, an insanely optimistic preacher with severe problems who rehabilitates ex-cons in his rural church. Adam (Ulrich

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Amsterdam Weekly_7-13 August 2008

AGENDA: FILM

Plata quemada (Burnt Money) Three Argentinean killers, two of them lovers (Eduardo Noriega and Leonardo Sbaraglia), hide out in Uruguay after a bank heist with a heavy body count and wait for false passports. Under the strain, things start to come apart. Marcelo Piñeyro’s slick, homoerotic 2000 thriller, set in 1965, aims to be as hot as possible; some might feel it succeeds, while others may be reminded of commercials for cologne. In Spanish with Dutch subtitles. (JR) 125 min. Rialto

Special screenings Avant que j’oublie In this elegant and witty film (showing in the Gay & Lesbian Summer Tour), director Jacques Nolot stars as an aging, HIV-positive gigolo seeking a new purpose in life. In French with Dutch subtitles. 108 min. Rialto

Control In this biopic on singer/songwriter Ian

Curtis, photographer and video director Anton Corbijn dares to be critical: Ian isn’t a tragic hero, but a bit of a wimp who uses his band as an escape from his own incompetence as a husband and father. The film is beautifully shot in black-and-white, though the stark contrasts and grey hues serve mainly to underline the desolation of the Manchester suburbs, and of Ian himself. (BS) 119 min. Het Ketelhuis Eden This tale of friendship, intimacy and food centres on the relationship between Eden (Charlotte Roche), an unhappily married waitress, and Gregor (Josef Ostendorf), an ugly chef whose sensuality all gets poured into his cuisine. They develop a friendship that makes everything, including Eden’s marriage, work better. But in German director Michael Hofmann’s film, no one can understand the platonic passion of the two foodies—least of all Eden’s jealous husband.

In German with Dutch subtitles. 98 min. Studio K eXistenZ David Cronenberg’s fine 1999 update of Videodrome. This time the self-reflexive examination is of virtual-reality games, and it makes full use of the similarities in different modes of vicarious experience, including narrative film-making. Jennifer Jason Leigh is a games designer whose fans are given the opportunity to test the prototype of her latest creation at a convention. But the attendees include an assassin who’s sworn to defend reality against the encroachment of institutionalised fantasy, forcing Leigh to go on the run with Jude Law, a marketing trainee who isn’t into gaming but takes his job very seriously. (LA) 97 min. Kriterion Fucking Åmål Politely known in English as Show Me Love, Lukas Moodysson’s 1998 first feature is a funny and appealing romantic drama about high school girls in love in small-town Sweden. In Swedish with Dutch subtitles. De Uitkijk

His Girl Friday Rosalind Russell is a hard-headed newspaper reporter, Cary Grant her unscrupulous boss in Howard Hawks’ 1939 film. It’s more Russell’s picture than Grant’s, but nothing’s wrong with that. It’s got the classic screwball comedy formula—tough female lead, Thomsen), a recently released neo-Nazi, arrives to test his fate, leading to a clash of conflicting ideologies. In Danish with Dutch subtitles. (LvH) 94 min. The Movies

Must see:

Sylvia Scarlett Filmmuseum, Wednesday, 19.30

snappy dialogue—and it’s one of the greats. (JP) 92 min. Filmmuseum Kilómetro 0 A dozen singles looking for love and sex on a sizzling day in Madrid pair up in this 2000 romantic comedy by Juan Luis Iborra and Yolanda García Serrano. Kilómetro 0, the square where most of them have arranged to rendezvous, is the symbolic center of Spain, and the characters are supposed to represent a cross section of the country’s sexually frustrated urbanites— gay, straight and otherwise. Iborra and Serrano try for an insouciant, enchanted tone but deliver mostly cuteness and hot air. With Concha Velasco and Tristán Ulloa. In Spanish with Dutch subtitles. (TS) 108 min. Rialto Mr Blandings Builds His Dream House Cary Grant’s power to redeem the thinnest material is amply demonstrated in this slight situation comedy about a city couple’s determination to build a suburban retreat, against all of the expected rural odds. HC Potter, a brisk if anonymous talent, directed; Myrna Loy and Melvyn Douglas also star. Scripted by Melvin Frank and Norman Panama from the Eric Hodgins

work, especially Bin-Jip, one of his real masterpieces.

Korean with Dutch subtitles (BS) 84 min. Rialto

sensational shots by rock’s, and now fashion’s, foremost photographer keep this documentary flowing.

Annie Leibovitz has always had timing: she grew up at Rolling Stone magazine, snapped Richard Nixon as he slinked off in shame and posed Arnold Schwarzenegger when he was better known as Mr Universe. She was also one of the last people to see John Lennon alive, when she took the iconic nude portrait of him curled up like a foetus next to Yoko Ono. Photography fans and old hippies will delight in every frame, unlike Keith Richards who mutters, ‘...uh, no, I don’t remember that’, when shown a photo of his drugged-out ’60s self splayed on the floor. Made by Barbara Leibovitz, the sister of, the film isn’t exactly critical, but who cares? (IM) 90 min. Rialto

De Brief voor de Koning Sixteen-year-old shieldbearer Tiuri (a completely miscast Yannick van de Velde) is about to be knighted when he meets a man who gives him a letter that is to be delivered to the king. The knight originally intended for the job is dead and Tiuti has to carry the letter himself. But some parties don’t want the letter to reach its destination. A dull looking film, De Brief voor de Koning suffers from that all too common disease among literary adaptations: being a slave to the source. Be it knight Edwinem’s death, Tiuri’s developing friendship with Piak or the mysterious Jorak trying to kill Tiuri, most scenes feel obligatory and add up to little more than a random series of events loosely connected in this unconvincing coming-of-age-story. In Dutch. (MP) 110 min. Het Ketelhuis, Pathé ArenA, Pathé De Munt, Pathé Tuschinski, Studio K

Le Ballon Rouge & Crin-Blanc These classic shorts

by French director Albert Lamorisse are so pure in their emotion and elemental in their drama that parents may be as moved as their kids. In Le Ballon Rouge (1956, 34 min.) a little boy’s blue-grey existence is brightened by the arrival of a dramatically red balloon; in the lesser-known Crin-Blanc (‘White Mane’, 1953, 40 min.) a boy forges a bond with a proud wild stallion. Both films tell the same story—the balloon is coveted by neighbourhood bullies, the stallion by mercenary horse wranglers—and both end with a moment of transcendence, as the boy and his prized ‘friend’ escape the cruel world of grown-ups for the limitless unknown. (JJ) De Uitkijk

The Children of Huang Shi Inspired by true events, this film is a would-be epic about young British journalist George Hogg (Jonathan Rhys Meyers), who ‘adopts’ and rescues 60 Chinese orphans from wartorn 1930s China. He leads his charges on an odyssey along the Silk Road, through snow-covered mountain ranges and across a blistering desert. But with its twodimensional characters and Hollywood/Tintin cliché of the heroic white man saving non-whites, The Children of Huang Shi just isn’t the sweeping film it pretends to be. Still, the cinematography by Zhao Xiaoding is ever so beautiful. Directed by Roger Spottiswoode. In Mandarin/Japanese/English with Dutch subtitles. (GR) 120 min. Pathé ArenA, Pathé Tuschinski

Breath When a woman discovers her husband is having an affair, she does what every normal woman would do: she starts having an affair with a prisoner on death row, much to the chagrin of her husband and the prisoner’s fellow inmates. Diehard fans of Kim Ki-duk’s work will undoubtedly embrace this latest feature wholeheartedly, but for the rest, it’s just not up to standard. Once again the story is filled with pregnant silences and tortured souls, desperately looking for a way to feel alive again. But Breath lacks the haunting beauty and sadness of Ki-duk’s previous

The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian One thing that is sorely missed in both the recent ‘Narnia’ and the ‘Lord of the Rings’ adaptations is their delicious sense of whimsy. The characters in the films usually take themselves much too seriously, a flaw that is virtually non-existent in the books. Prince Caspian, Andrew Adamson’s second outing for the ‘The Chronicles of Narnia’ franchise, is even more grim and violent— although not a drop of (visual) blood is spilled—and less cute, despite the presence of a talking badger and a very heroic mouse (voiced by Eddie Izzard). This time,

Annie Leibovitz: Life Through a Lens A torrent of

Puccini for Beginners Maria Maggenti follows her debut feature, The Incredibly True Adventures of Two Girls in Love, with this smart romantic comedy about an operaloving, commitment-phobic lesbian novelist (Elizabeth Reasor). Dumped by her lover, she gets involved with a philosophy scholar and, unwittingly, his fragile girlfriend.

Fresh Manhattan locations prove as photogenic as the leads, and the supporting actors—especially Tina Benko as a glacial, impeccably dressed amazon—don’t miss a beat of Maggenti’s snappy dialogue. (AG) 82 min. Rialto

Open-air is the new indoors. Rain is the new popcorn.

novel of the same name. 94 min. Filmmuseum Once Upon a Honeymoon Leo McCarey’s astonishing attempt to blend screwball comedy and wartime propaganda—even more astonishing because, by and large, it works. Ginger Rogers is an American gold digger who marries Nazi Walter Slezak on the eve of the war; it’s the job of radio correspondent Cary Grant to get her working for our side. Despite some windy passages, the film’s equation of true love and the US democratic ideal (when it still believed in one) is irresistible, quintessential McCarey. With Albert Dekker and Albert Bassermann. 117 min. Filmmuseum

Only Angels Have Wings Howard Hawks’s 1939

film is set is a South American port where a group of fliers, led by Cary Grant, challenges the elements nightly by piloting mail across a treacherous mountain range. This all-male existential ritual is invaded by an American showgirl (Jean Arthur) who becomes fascinated by the heightened, heady atmosphere of primal struggle. Thursday’s screening will be introduced by the director Frans Weisz. (DK) 121 min. Filmmuseum

the four Pevensie siblings have to save the Narnians from the despotic clutches of King Miraz while simultaneously learning a valuable lesson about keeping the faith. English (BS) 147 min. Pathé ArenA, Pathé De Munt Comandante The first film of a projected trilogy on doctrinaire political leaders, Oliver Stone’s documentary about Fidel Castro was culled from a series of interviews that Stone did over three days with the Cuban dictator. It’s most effective as a meditation on personality, revealing the men’s common obsessions, and least effective as a look at Castro’s totalitarian politics. Photographed in part by the excellent Rodrigo Prieto (25th Hour), the movie also includes a gracefully melancholy portrait of contemporary Havana. In English and subtitled Spanish. 93 min. Kriterion

The

Darjeeling Limited Sometimes you travel through life with some extra baggage. In the case of the Whitman brothers, it’s a luxury Louis Vuitton set that looks colourful and flashy even in India. A year after their father’s funeral, Francis (Owen Wilson), Peter (Adrien Brody) and Jack (Jason Schwartzman) meet aboard a train for a journey of spiritual healing.

The fact that they have not spoken to each other in a year doesn’t prevent them from getting straight into the family’s old dynamics, which involve manic tics, substance abuse and sexual escapades. But soon both the emotional and the physical baggage starts to fall away. Film-maker Wes Anderson (Rushmore, The Royal Tenenbaums), much like his characters, has found his grown-up voice. This delicious curry comedy is a rich plate for film-goers, entertaining and poignant, just as it should be. (MB) 108 min. Kriterion

The

Dark Knight There is nothing camp about Christopher Nolan’s second (and vastly superior) outing in the Batman franchise—although Christian Bale’s slightly ridiculous, husky voice as Batman could still use some fine tuning. Gone are the days of Burtonesque villains and nippled crusaders. This is as grim and realistic as it gets. In Nolan’s Gotham City there are no superheroes or supercrooks, just very disturbed people—notably Batman’s nemesis the Joker, who, in the late Heath Ledger’s incarnation, has never been more deranged nor more menacing. (His inventive pencil-disappearing-trick probably won’t find its way to

SMS Sugar Man Directed by Dutch-South African avant-gardist Aryan Kaganof (a.k.a. Ian Kerkhof), this feature film was shot on several mobile phones, one for each member of the cast. Kaganof plays Sugar Man, a pimp who starts to lose his hold on reality as he chauffeurs three call girls to their appointments at Johannesburg hotels. iLLUSEUM Songs from the Second Floor Working with no script and mostly non-professional actors, Swedish director Roy Andersson tells the story of a middle-aged businessman so worn down by caring for his mentally ill son that he decides to burn down his factory. The lugubrious, impressionistic music is by Benny Andersson of Abba. In Swedish with Dutch subtitles. (TS) 98 min. De Uitkijk

Sylvia Scarlett Cary Grant’s first film with Katharine

Hepburn, this 1935 feature may also be the most interesting and audacious movie George Cukor ever made.

Hepburn disguises herself as a boy to escape from France to England with her crooked father. They fall in with a group of travelling players, including Grant at his most cockney; the ambiguous sexual feelings that Hepburn as a boy stirs in both Grant and Brian Aherne are part of what makes this film so subversive. Genre shifts match gender shifts as the film disconcertingly changes tone every few minutes, from farce to tragedy to romance to crime thriller—rather like the French New Wave films that were to come a quarter century later. It flopped miserably when it came out but survives as one of the most poetic, magical and inventive Hollywood films of its era. (JR) 95 min. Filmmuseum

5 word movie review

Karaoke Before It Was Cool The Commitments, Cavia Open Air

children’s parties anytime soon.) A haunting (and haunted) masterpiece. (BS) 152 min. Pathé ArenA, Pathé De Munt, Pathé Tuschinski

Dialogue avec mon jardinier This film could just

as well have been called ‘Zen and the art of gardening’. Separated from his wife, a crisp-looking, middle-aged Parisian painter (Daniel Auteuil) retreats to the house he grew up in, in rural France. His gardener there (Jean-Pierre Darrousin) turns out to be his partner in mischief from their schooldays. While one paints and the other grows vegetables, they comment on the world in front of them. ‘Don’t you look at the sunset, the stars, the fog?’ asks the painter. ‘I don’t usually see much of anything in a fog,’ replies the gardener. What is art to one is garbage to the other, and vice versa. Director Jean Becker has kept the material down-to-earth, and steers away from possible sentimentality with a couple of good laughs. In French with Dutch subtitles. (KE) 109 min. The Movies Dunya & Desie A reasonably entertaining parade of ethnic and class stereotypes, based on the TV series and directed by Dana Nechushtan (Nachtrit). With Eva van de Wijdeven as kaaskop teenager Desie and the award-winning Maryam Hassouni as her Moroccan best friend Dunya. In Dutch. 96 min. Het Ketelhuis

El cielo, la tierra y la lluvia ‘Languid’ is probably the best word to describe the feel of José Luis Torres

Amsterdam Weekly_7-13 August 2008

AGENDA: FILM

Leiva’s feature film debut, winner of this year’s Fipresci prize at Rotterdam. (The title translates as ‘Sky, Earth and Rain’.) On a remote island along the Chilean coast the camera silently observes the lives of three young women and one man, each caught up in a private isolation. With the same meditative quality he showcased in his earlier documentaries, Torres Leiva has made a fascinating meditation on loneliness, and on human beings and their surroundings. In Spanish with English subtitles. (BS) 110 min. Filmmuseum

Gleeson), on the other hand, has the time of his life.

They are the heart and soul of In Bruges, a surprisingly intelligent and unconventional crime caper. Here, the characters actually think for themselves, and about others! Of course there is the inevitable shoot-out, also featuring Ray and Ken’s exasperated boss Harry (Ralph Fiennes), but even that one evolves out of a brutal yet irrefutable internal logic. A simultaneously exciting and sobering feature debut from playwright Martin McDonagh. (BS) 107 min. Cinecenter, The Movies

Le Fils de l’épicier A road movie of sorts, with a very French twist. The story is a bit flimsy: a young man (the grocer’s son of the title) helps his parents when they’re in trouble and sorts himself out along the way. The film’s strength is in its humane view of its characters and painterly eye for the landscape. As Antoine (Nicolas Cazalé) grudgingly drives his dad’s delivery van around, his brusqueness doing little for his sales or relations with the old clientele, we’re treated to breathtaking wide-angle shots of Provence. Close friend Claire (Clotilde Hesme), former femme fatale Lucienne (Liliane Rovère) and increasingly senile father Clément (Paul Crauchet) play crucial, and sometimes very funny, roles while Antoine adjusts to his new life. Eric Guirado directed this feel-good film with an eye for the individual. In French with Dutch subtitles. (KE) 96 min.

Cinecenter

Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull Indiana Jones has aged 20 years, from the 1930s to the 1950s, and in the Spielberg/Lucas universe this means hot rod cars and Triumph bikes, bland college McCarthyism, nasty Soviet comrades, the atomic scare and, yes, UFOs. The period shift works pretty well, and gives the film-makers a new palette of elements in which to play with their old character. Professor Jones has aged gracefully, and so has Harrison Ford, joined here by his original Raiders co-star Karen Allen (still Indy’s ex-girlfriend) and newcomer Shia LaBeouf. As in Raiders, there are countless movie quotations to keep the film buffs busy; and overall Indy 4 manages to temporarily recreate that nostalgic sense of wonder that’s been painfully lacking in recent cinema. (MB) 123 min. Pathé ArenA

Forgetting Sarah Marshall Jason Segel scripted and stars in this solidly funny romantic comedy. The setup isn’t much: after getting ditched by his TV star girlfriend (Kristen Bell), Segel checks into a Hawaiian resort hotel and finds her there with her absurdly hot pop-star boyfriend, Aldous Snow (Russell Brand). But in producer Judd Apatow’s usual style, Segel mines a mother lode of painful personal memories for his breakup gags, and the vanity of entertainment people proves to be another rich vein. Nicholas Stoller directs; with Mila Kunis, Bill Hader, Paul Rudd and Jonah Hill.

English, Hawaiian 112 min. Pathé De Munt Hancock Will Smith stars as an embittered superhero who leaps tall buildings in a single bound while cursing and slugging down bourbon. After he rescues goodhearted PR man Jason Bateman from an oncoming freight train, Bateman offers to return the favour by giving him an image makeover. As popcorn movies go, this is fleet, funny and even thoughtful: its central question, nicely underplayed by director Peter Berg, is why power and altruism never seem to intersect. With Charlize Theron. 92 min. Pathé ArenA, Pathé De Munt

Happy-Go-Lucky Poppy (Sally Hawkins) teaches

kindergarten in North London, lives in a flatshare with her best friend and fellow teacher Zoe, goes clubbing on Friday nights, and is the kind of person who, in the words of Eric Idle, always looks on the bright side of life. For example, she regards the fact that her bike has been stolen as motivation to improve her skills and decides to take driving lessons instead. That’s how she ends up meeting Scott (Eddie Marsan), who’s basically her opposite. Not much happens in Mike Leigh’s latest film, but Hawkins’s Poppy is one of the great characters of the current cinematic year.

(MB) Kriterion, Studio K, De Uitkijk Heure d’été, L Two brothers and a sister (Juliette Binoche) witness the disappearance of their childhood memories when their mother dies and her house is sold. Directed by Olivier Assayas, this is the second film in a series produced by the Musée d’Orsay; the first was Le Voyage du Ballon Rouge. 100 min. The Movies Il y a longtemps que je t’aime Kristin Scott Thomas is a talent who cannot be used often enough. Her characters are usually hard-as-nails socialites, who fanatically guard their real emotions with cynicism and acerbic wit.

In Il y a longtemps que je t’aime (I loved you for so long), she has never been more brittle, or so tough. Her Juliette has just been released after 15 years in prison for a crime that seems beyond comprehension. Still, Juliette has refused to defend her actions, even to her younger sister Léa (Elsa Zylberstein), who desperately wants to understand. A strong, composed debut by novelist Philippe Claudel. In French with Dutch subtitles.

(BS) 115 min. Cinecenter, Het Ketelhuis

In Bruges ‘Fucking Bruges!’ To say that Irish hitman

Ray (Colin Farrell) is less than impressed with the ‘bestpreserved medieval city in Belgium’ is an understatement—although he’s elated when he sees a midget doing a film shoot. His colleague Ken (Brendan

Into the Wild Moving, if somewhat overlong, account of the life of Christopher McCandless, with a bravura performance from Emile Hirsch. At the age of 22, McCandless left his wealthy, dysfunctional family, gave his college cash to Oxfam and took off into the breathtaking beauty of the American wilderness. What starts as a run-of-the-mill road movie twists into an American Odyssey as, after two years away from it all, McCandless meets an untimely death in the wilds of Alaska. The usual Characters Met Along the Way include Catherine Keener, Vince Vaughn and Hal Holbrook. McCandless won’t stick with any of them, and gradually begins to unravel in his determined solitude.

The film becomes a meditation on the human need for human company, framed against some of the most glorious scenery the world has to offer. A triumph for Sean Penn as a director, backed by a custom soundtrack from Pearl Jam’s Eddie Vedder. (AD) 140 min.

Kriterion, The Movies, Pathé Tuschinski Kung Fu Panda Just when you got sick and tired of all those yapping animals, DreamWorks comes along with a fresh twist that makes chattering critters not only acceptable, but even fun again. Jack Black voices the sluggish panda Po, whose quest for martial mastery yields a fine mixture of awe-inspiring action and genuinely funny Kung foolery. The voice actors include Dustin Hoffman, Jacky Chan and Angelina Jolie, who all do fine work, but Black steals the show with his patented goofball semantics. Add luscious animation that combines Western CGI with Eastern aesthetics, and you’ve got a recipe for attractive awesomeness indeed. (LvH) 92 min. Pathé ArenA, Pathé De Munt

Lemon Tree This bittersweet comedy-drama by

Israeli director Eran Riklis tells the story of Salma, a Palestinian widow whose lemon grove stands dangerously close to the new country house of the Israeli Defence Minister. When an order is issued to cut down the trees for security reasons, her fight to defend them takes on a greater significance. Hiam Abbass, the Anna Magnani of the Middle East, turns in a great performance as Salma, amid a strong supporting cast. In Arabic/Hebrew/English with Dutch subtitles. (MB) 106 min. Cinecenter, Rialto Mamma Mia! The Movie You’ll either love or hate this remake of the hit musical. Here’s the litmus test: is your body gyrating at the thought of an all-star cast including Meryl Streep, Pierce Brosnan and Colin Firth, pouring on the schmaltz with one happy, catchy ABBA song after another? Be honest. That’s what we thought. Now grab the phone and invite your friends. (AG) 108 min. Pathé ArenA, Pathé De Munt, Pathé Tuschinski Married Life A macabre comedy of manners with the sting of dry ice, this 2007 ensemble piece captures the social climate of America in the late ’40s, when a new anxiety and restlessness began to undermine the postwar optimism. A New York businessman (Chris Cooper) becomes smitten with a young widow (Rachel McAdams) and decides to bump off his devoted wife (Patricia Clarkson). Pierce Brosnan enlivens the convoluted story as Cooper’s best friend, who also serves as the narrator. Ira Sachs directs a screenplay

FILM TIMES Thursday 7 August until Wednesday 13 August. Times are provided by cinemas and are subject to last-minute changes.

Cavia Open-Air Cinema Spaarndammerplantsoen, 475 0924, The Commitments Sat 21.15.

Cineac Reguliersbreestraat 31-33, CineacT Thur 21.00.

Cinecenter Lijnbaansgracht 236, 623 6615 Le Fils de l'épicier daily 16.30, 19.15, 21.45, Sun also 11.15, 14.00 Il y a longtemps que je t'aime daily 16.15, 19.00, 21.45, Sun also 11.00, 13.30 In Bruges daily 16.30, 19.30, 22.00, Sun also 11.00, 13.45 Lemon Tree daily 16.15, 19.15, Sun also 11.00 La Noche de los girasoles daily 21.45, Sun also 13.30.

Filmmuseum Vondelpark 3, 589 1400 El cielo, la tierra y la lluvia Thur-Sat 17.10, Sun-Wed 19.15 The Grass is Greener Fri 17.00 His Girl Friday Sun 14.30 Mr Blandings Builds His Dream House Sat 19.30 North by Northwest Thur-Sat 19.15, Sun 14.30, 21.30, Mon-Wed 21.30 Once Upon a Honeymoon Sun 19.30 Only Angels Have Wings Thur, Fri, Mon, Tues 19.30, Sat, Sun 17.00 Small Gods daily 21.45, Sun also 15.00 Suspicion Thur, Wed 17.00 Sylvia Scarlett Wed 19.30 The Talk of the Town Mon 17.00 This Is England Thur-Sat 22.00, Sun-Wed 17.15 To Catch a Thief Tues 17.00.

Filmmuseum Open Air Vondelpark Nachtrit Fri 21.30. iLLUSEUM Witte de Withstraat 120, 770 5581 SMS Sugar Man Sat 20.00.

Het Ketelhuis Haarlemmerweg 8-10, 684 0090 De Brief voor de Koning daily 12.30, 14.45, 19.15 Control Sat 22.00 Dunya & Desie Thur, Sat-Wed 17.00 Hoe overleef ik mezelf daily 12.45 Il y a longtemps que je t'aime daily 16.45, 19.00, 21.30 Kung Fu Panda (NL) daily 15.00, 17.15, 19.30 Mataharis daily 14.45, 21.30 Morrison krijgt een zusje daily 13.15 Le Voyage du ballon rouge daily 21.15.

Kriterion Roetersstraat 170, 623 1708 Comandante daily 19.30 The Darjeeling Limited daily 19.45 eXistenZ Sat 20.00 Happy-Go-Lucky Thur-Mon, Wed 22.15 Horton (NL) daily 14.45 Into the Wild daily 19.15 Lang leve de Koninging daily 15.15 La Noche de los girasoles daily 16.45, Thur, Fri, Sun-Wed also 21.45, Fri also 0.00 Sneak Preview Tues 22.15 Tropa de Elite daily 17.30, 22.00, Fri, Sat also 0.15 Wall-E (NL) daily 15.00, 17.00 Week of the Games daily.

The Movies Haarlemmerdijk 159-165, 638 6016 4 maanden, 3 weken en 2 dagen Sat, Sun, Mon 17.00, Sun also 12.45 Adam's Apples Fri, Sat 23.15, Sun 12.30, Tues, Wed 17.00 Dialogue avec mon jardinier daily 17.15, Sun also 12.15 Fireflies in the Garden daily 19.30, 21.30, Thur-Sun, Wed also 14.30 Heure d’été, L daily 16.45 In Bruges daily 21.45, Thur-Sun, Wed also 14.45 Into the Wild daily 19.15, 22.00 Nim's Eiland daily 17.15, Thur-Sun, Wed also 15.15 Sex and the City: The Movie daily 18.45 Wall-E daily 19.00, 21.15 Wall-E (NL) Thur-Sun, Wed 15.00, Thur, Fri also 17.15, Sun also 13.00.

Pathé ArenA ArenA Boulevard 600, 0900 1458 De Brief voor de Koning daily 10.20, 15.00 The Children of Huang Shi daily 18.00 The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian daily 17.10 The Dark Knight (Imax) daily 12.00, 15.10, 18.20, 21.30 The Dark Knight daily 11.00, 14.10, 17.20, 21.40, Thur-Tues also 20.40, Sat also 23.50, Wed also 21.00 Get Smart Sat 23.40 Hancock daily 17.50, 20.00, 22.10, Thur-Mon, Wed also 21.20, Sat also 23.35, 0.15 Hoe overleef ik mezelf daily 10.30 Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull daily 18.40 De Kronieken van Narnia: Prins Caspian daily 10.05, 13.00 Kung Fu Panda daily 12.50, 17.40 Kung Fu Panda (Imax) daily 10.00 Kung Fu Panda (NL) daily 11.40, 12.45, 13.50, 14.50, 16.20 Mamma Mia! The Movie daily 15.50, 18.10, 20.50 The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor daily 11.45, 14.15, 16.45, 18.30, 19.15, 21.00, 21.50, Sat also 23.30 Never Back Down daily 18.40, 21.10, Sat also 23.15 Nim's Eiland daily 11.10, 13.30, 15.40

19

Plop en de Kabouterschat daily 10.15, Thur also 12.15 Sex and the City: The Movie daily 20.30 Singh is Kinng Fri-Wed 12.15, 15.15, 18.15, 21.15, Sat also 0.10 Sneak Preview Tues 21.20 Snuf de Hond in oorlogstijd Thur 14.05, 16.15 The Strangers daily 20.10, 22.15, Sat also 0.20 Wall-E daily 11.50, 14.20, 16.40, 18.55, 21.10, Sat also 23.20 Wall-E (NL) daily 10.10, 11.20, 12.20, 13.45, 14.40, 16.10, 17.00 The X-Files: I Want to Believe daily 10.50, 13.10, 15.30, 19.30, 22.00, Sat also 0.20 You Don't Mess With the Zohan daily 11.30, 14.00, 16.30, 19.00, 21.45, Sat also 0.15.

Pathé De Munt Vijzelstraat 15, 0900 1458 21: Las Vegas Thur, Fri, Sun, Mon, Wed 21.25, Sat 22.00 De Brief voor de Koning Thur, Fri, Sun-Wed 16.40, Thur, Fri, Sun also 11.30, 14.10, Mon-Wed also 12.00, 14.15, Sat 12.10, 14.40, 17.10 The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian Thur, Fri, Sun-Wed 18.15, Sat 18.50 The Dark Knight daily 16.00, 17.30, 21.00, Thur, Fri, Sun-Wed also 12.30, 14.00, 20.00, Thur, Fri, Sun also 10.30, Sat 10.45, 12.45, 14.15, 19.15, 22.45 Forgetting Sarah Marshall Thur, Fri, Sun-Wed 19.20, Sat 19.40 Hancock Thur, Fri, Sun-Wed 14.15, 16.45, 19.10, 21.30, Sat 11.15, 16.30, 18.45, 21.15, 23.40 Hoe overleef ik mezelf Thur, Fri, Sun 11.45, Sat 13.45, MonWed 12.00 Kung Fu Panda Thur, Fri, Sun-Wed 12.15, 14.45, 17.15, 19.40, 22.10, Sat also 11.10, 13.30, 15.40, 18.00, 20.15, 23.00 Kung Fu Panda (NL) Thur, Fri, Sun-Wed 13.20, 15.50, Thur, Fri, Sun also 11.00, Sat 11.40, 13.50, 16.20 Mamma Mia! The Movie Thur, Fri, Sun-Wed 13.15, 16.10, 18.45, 21.20, Thur, Fri, Sun also 10.50, Sat 12.10, 14.45, 17.15, 20.00, 22.50 The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor daily 19.00, 21.45, Thur, Fri, Sun-Wed also 13.30, 16.15, 18.00, 20.45, Thur, Fri, Sun also 10.45, Sat also 12.30, 15.00, 17.45, 20.30, 23.15 Nim's Eiland Thur, Fri, Sun-Wed 12.45, 15.15, 17.45, Thur-Sun also 10.30, Sat 13.00, 15.30 Sex and the City: The Movie Thur, Fri, Sun-Wed 20.20, Tues also 21.10, Sat 18.15, 21.30 Sneak Preview Tues 21.30 The Strangers Thur, Fri, Sun-Wed 22.05, Sat 22.15 Wall-E Thur, Fri, Sun-Wed 12.00, 14.30, 17.00, 19.30, 22.00, Sat 11.00, 13.15, 15.45, 18.15, 20.45, 23.30 Wall-E (NL) Thur, Fri, Sun-Wed 12.50, 15.30, Thur, Fri, Sun also 10.15, Sat 11.30, 14.00, 16.30 The X-Files: I Want to Believe Thur, Fri, Sun-Wed 13.45, 16.30, 19.15, 21.50, Thur, Fri, Sun also 11.15, Sat 12.00, 14.20, 16.45, 19.30, 22.15 You Don't Mess With the Zohan Thur, Fri, Sun-Wed 13.00, 15.45, 18.30, 21.15, Thur, Fri, Sun also 10.20, Sat 12.00, 14.30, 17.00, 19.45, 22.30.

Pathé Tuschinski Reguliersbreestraat 34, 0900 1458 ABBA, The Movie Thur 20.00 The Accidental Husband Wed 20.45 De Brief voor de Koning daily 12.15 The Children of Huang Shi daily 18.45 The Dark Knight daily 13.00, 16.30, 20.30 Fireflies in the Garden daily 12.15, 15.30, 18.30, 21.15 Into the Wild Fri-Tues 21.15 Kung Fu Panda (NL) daily 12.00, 14.30 Mamma Mia! The Movie daily 12.30, 15.15, 18.00, Fri-Tues also 21.00, Thur, Wed also 21.15 Married Life daily 16.45, 19.00 Sex and the City: The Movie daily 21.30 Then She Found Me daily 15.00 Wall-E daily 19.15, 21.40 Wall-E (NL) daily 13.15, 16.00.

Pluk de Nacht Open-Air Cinema Stenen Hoofd Belovy Sun 21.30 In My Father's Den Thur 21.30 Kort en Koud Mon 21.30 Magnus Fri 21.30 Pluk de Nacht The Squid and the Whale Sat 21.30.

Rialto Ceintuurbaan 338, 676 8700 Annie Leibovitz: Life Through a Lens daily 21.15, Fri, Sat, MonWed also 17.15, 19.30, Sat also 15.00 Avant que j'oublie Fri 23.00 Breath daily 18.00, 22.00 Kilómetro 0 Sat 23.00 Lemon Tree Thur 17.00, 19.15, 21.30, Sat also 14.45 Plata quemada (Burnt Money) Sun 18.45 Puccini for Beginners Sun 16.00 Pudor daily 19.45, Sat, Sun also 15.30.

Studio K Timorplein 62, 692 0422, De Brief voor de Koning daily 14.15, 16.45 Eden daily 19.15 Finding Nemo (NL) daily 14.30 Happy-Go-Lucky daily 16.30, 21.15 Sex and the City: The Movie daily 20.30.

De Uitkijk Prinsengracht 452, 623 7460 Le Ballon Rouge & Crin-Blanc Sat, Sun 15.30, Wed 15.00 Fucking Åmål Thur-Sun 21.30 Happy-Go-Lucky Mon, Tues 19.00, Wed 18.30 Kung Fu Panda (NL) Thur, Fri, Mon, Tues 15.00, Sat, Sun 13.30, Wed 13.00 Married Life Thur-Tues 17.00, Wed 16.30 Paris Thur-Sun 19.00 Songs from the Second Floor Mon, Tues 21.30, Wed 21.00.

20

Amsterdam Weekly_7-13 August 2008

AGENDA: FILM he co-wrote with Oren Moverman (I’m Not There).

(AG) 90 min. Pathé Tuschinski, De Uitkijk The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor A belated third installment to the horror franchise that began with The Mummy (1999) and continued with The Mummy Returns (2001). Rob Cohen (The Fast and the Furious) directed; with Brendan Fraser, Jet Li and Maria Bello. 114 min. Pathé ArenA, Pathé De Munt La Noche de los girasoles If you had plans to visit the lovely Spanish countryside for your summer holidays, you might reconsider after watching this grim and downbeat Hitchcockian Spanish art house thriller. A rape and murder in a rural town set up the Rashomonlike structure in which six characters are followed in six seperate chapters, with each chapter cleverly expanding the audience’s knowledge and deftly expanding our point of view. The depravity and dark view of human nature might be too much to stomach for the faint of heart, as every ounce of innocence is squeezed from the film throughout the two hours of running time.

In Spanish with Dutch subtitles. (LvH) 118 min. Cinecenter, Kriterion

Paris This Altmanesque tale, written and directed

by Cédric Klapisch (Chacun cherche son chat), is centred around a male dancer (Romain Duris) who needs a heart transplant and has to come to terms with his fear of death. But he’s the least interesting of the characters who drop by in this interwoven, matter-of-fact assortment of stories—one that, among other things, attempts to elevate ordinary street market workers to sex gods capable of reeling in the supermodels. The dreaded French cliché pops up time and time again, but a fairly uninteresting main character is about all that plagues this appealing Parisian slice of life. Juliette Binoche leads an excellent ensemble cast. In French with Dutch subtitles. (LvH) 130 min. De Uitkijk Pudor ‘Don’t you smell it?’ Julia (Elvira Minguez) asks her husband Alfredo (Nancho Novo) during a meal with their teenage daughter, young son and widowed grandfather. And, sure enough, something’s definitely gone off in Pudor. The Spanish family of five deals with an incredible multitude of problems, ranging from teen trouble to a brain tumour, and anything and everything in between. The acting and photography are solid, but directors David and Tristán Ulloa still have lessons to learn. A little restraint would have gone a long way in their feature film debut. In Spanish with Dutch subtitles. (KE) 113 min. Rialto Sex and the City: The Movie Those who hate the original TV series will stay as far away from this as from an STD. Fans of the New York female foursome will flock to theatres as fast as when a new collection hits H&M. If you’re sentimental and have a soft spot for Carrie, Miranda, Charlotte and Samantha, bring your hankies. (MB) 144 min. The Movies, Pathé ArenA, Pathé De Munt, Pathé Tuschinski, Studio K Snuf de Hond in oorlogstijd Snuf the Dog and his owner, the young orphan Tom, help the Canadians liberate a Frisian village in this family film from Steven de Jong (De Kameleon). Watch for the Weekly’s own Canadian, Steve Korver, in a minor but important role.

In Dutch. 95 min. Pathé ArenA The Strangers Young lovers Liv Tyler and Scott Speedman, arriving at his parents’ remote summer home after a wedding, are terrorised in the wee hours by three masked assailants whose motives are never explained. Making his debut as writer-director, Bryan Bertino exploits all the old horror standbys—the phony based-on-a-true-story preface, the knock on the door in the dead of night, the eerily skipping record on the turntable, the malevolent figure glimpsed in soft focus over the heroine’s shoulder. There’s nothing remotely new here, but the movie has the taut, queasy feel of an early ’70s drive-in shocker: old-fashioned suspense without any guarantee of old-fashioned mercy. (JJ) 90 min. Pathé ArenA, Pathé De Munt Then She Found Me An elementary school teacher (Helen Hunt) is ditched by her husband (Matthew

Broderick) after only months of marriage and faces the prospect of turning 40 without children. This emotional crisis is heightened by the sudden appearance of her birth mother (Bette Midler), who gave her up for adoption years earlier and is now the expansive host of a morning TV talk show. This adaptation of an Elinor Lipman novel is Hunt’s feature directing debut, and under the circumstances she might have been wiser to give the lead role to someone else. Her crabby performance weighs on the film, though it’s nothing compared to Colin Firth’s scenery-chewing turn as her self-lacerating new beau. English 100 min. Pathé Tuschinski This Is England In Meantime (1983), Mike Leigh explored what might produce a skinhead in London’s East End. Harking back to the same year on the north coast of England, writer-director Shane Meadows builds on his own memories of what turned him into a skinhead, making his hero (Thomas Turgoose) a lonely outcast who’s recently lost his father in the Falklands war. The way this 12-year-old on summer holiday falls under the protective influence of first a relatively gentle gang leader (Joe Gilgun), then an ex-con more prone to rapid mood swings and racial hatred (Stephen Graham), is masterfully charted and acted, as are the boy’s early forays into sex. This 2006 film falters only when it drifts too predictably into a coming-of-age moral fable.

(JR) 102 min. Filmmuseum Tropa de Elite Months before it won the top prize at the Berlin Film Festival, Tropa de Elite was already the most illegally downloaded film ever in Brazil, with more than 1.5 million pirated copies sold. Industry insiders looked at this as not only a fantastic publicity stunt but a way to dismiss controversy regarding the film’s main theme: brutal police violence on the streets of Rio. The Elite Squad of the title claim to be the world’s most effective urban warriors, and their fascistic methods are portrayed in extremely realistic terms. The film’s high-octane action and right-wing morals make it feel like a Hollywood cop thriller with a samba soundtrack.

It’s no surprise that Tropa director José Padilha is now attached to an action movie at Warner Bros, appropriately titled A Willing Patriot. In Portuguese with Dutch subtitles. (MB) 118 min. Kriterion Le Voyage du ballon rouge Chinese master HsiaoHsien Hou (Café Lumière, Three Times) has based his first French-language feature loosely on Albert Lamorisse’s 1956 classic Le Ballon rouge. Here the balloon and the story follow young Chinese film-maker Song (Song Fang), who moonlights as a nanny in the house of Suzanne, an edgy, emotionally unstable voice actress (Juliette Binoche in another brilliant, subtle role). Song bonds with Suzanne’s son, but still there’s something missing, symbolised by the presence of the self-willed red balloon, which peeks through windows and peeps around corners. In French with Dutch subtitles. (BS) 113 min. Het Ketelhuis Wall-E It goes without saying that the new offering by the animating geniuses at Pixar is a marvel to behold and an example of old school Hollywood storytelling at its finest. But while the Pixars succeed in infusing the two most inanimate characters in cartoon history with compelling personalities—-which was Pixar’s stated goal—-you can’t help but wonder if you’re in the middle of an animating pissing contest. They’ve more than proven themselves as animators; now they need to focus on great stories. That said, the robots are awfully cute. (LvH) 98 min. The Movies, Pathé ArenA, Pathé De Munt, Pathé Tuschinski

Edited by Julie Phillips. This week’s films reviewed by Lisa Alspector (LA), Massimo Benvegnù (MB), Angela Dress (AD), Kate Eaton (KE), Laura Groeneveld (LG), Andrea Gronvall (AG), Luuk van Huët (LvH), JR Jones (JJ), Dave Kehr (DK), Iris Maher (IM), Mike Peek (MP), Julie Phillips (JP), Gusta Reijnders (GR), Jonathan Rosenbaum (JR), Bregtje Schudel (BS) and Ted Shen (TS). All films are screened in English with Dutch subtitles unless otherwise noted.

Web tip:

Jacques Brel – Amsterdam http://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=pk7YxDzjTxA

Open-air is the new indoors. Rain is the new popcorn.

Amsterdam Weekly_7-13 August 2008

DINING/DRINKING

The Mouth

By Nanci Tangeman

On Spanish time Sal Gorda Van Breestraat 107, 673 0877 Open 17:00-22.30 Sun-Thur, 17.00-23:00 Fri-Sat Cash, PIN, VISA, MC It’s my own damn fault. I could have bought a plane ticket to Barcelona for €99. But I didn’t. So here I sit watching a July thunderstorm hammer down on Van Breestraat. At least I have my (first) half litre of rosé and my partnerin-all-things-torrential to cheer me up.

Eres Tu blares from the sound system.

Things aren’t so bad.

And thanks to the many, many tiny plates at the Sal Gorda tapas bar, things are about to get a lot better.

(The dear little square-ish carafes of house rosé don’t hurt, either.)

Long a favourite in the not-so-edgy Amsterdam Zuid neighbourhood, Sal Gorda specialises in tapas—small Spanish appetisers designed to help you drink a lot of wine. If I had bought that €99 ticket to Spain, I would be spending the awkward hours leading up to my 11pm Spanish dinner standing in a tapas bar, open to the sunny street, quenching my thirst and curbing my appetite with the lovely wee dishes.

This being Amsterdam, I sit indoors, watch the rain, order ten little plates with Partner, and then scurry home to our warm duvet.

Sal Gorda’s menu offers almost 40 tapas. You can order individually by the numbers, or you can be lazy and let the chef choose for you: nine plates (€18.00 per person) or 14 plates (€25.00 per person). We decide to put together our own culinary lottery with numbers 62, 71,

75, 79, 81, 94, 101, 104, 105 and a bit of 110.

We start with a plate of olives (€3.50) because aceitunas is one of my favourite words to say in Spanish. Then the real food begins: Champignones al Ajillo (€4.00), a pile of fresh mushrooms in lots of garlicky oil; Calamares a la Romana (€6.00), lightly breaded and still hot from the fryer; and a dull Pollo Miel y Mostaza (€5.75), whose honey mustard sauce doesn’t really blend well with the green and white Moorish arches and cracked plaster booths of Sal Gorda. To add to the colour clash, we order another half litre of rosé. The tiny upstairs dining room is a bit stuffy, with the large windows nailed shut and a small oscillating fan in the corner, but you could argue that it lends a sort of Spanish heat to the restaurant. As does our next dish, Chorizo Infierno (€4.00), both spice- and temperature-hot. Not the usual Dutch worst. This being the land of the Potato Eaters, the fiery Patatas Bravas (€4.00) steal the show.

The Queso de Cabra (€4.50), squares of crostini topped with goat cheese and honey, are sweet enough for dessert. Two Pimientos Rellenos (€5.50) taste freshly stuffed. I don’t recognise the Spanish (or Dutch) description for Datiles (dadels) con Bacon (€4.25). But as I bite into the salty/sweet skewer, I comprehend the word for dates in two more languages--and have a new favourite tapa. We round things out with an Ensalata Mixta (€4.75).

Ten tiny dishes and two not-so-tiny half litres of rosé later, the restaurant is almost empty. Just after 10pm on a Saturday night.

True tapas scheduling. The rains have stopped. The streets feel almost like summer. And I don’t feel so bad about not buying that €99 airplane ticket. ___

I comprehend the word for dates in two more languages-and have a new favourite tapa.

A night in the life...

By Sarah Gehrke

Getting in a twist Twstd Weteringschans 157, 320 6408 Open Sun-Thur 18.00-01.00, Fri-Sat 18.00-03.00 Cash only ‘Yeah, Berlin was pretty cool,’ says the blonde guy, sitting on a bench outside Twstd. ‘But you’re not allowed to laugh there. No, seriously! We were in our youth hostel, sitting in the back yard. It was a Saturday night, before twelve. We were sitting there, drinking and laughing a lot. Like the fun people that we are. And someone called the police on us! Before twelve!

Someone called the police on us!’

As you might know, Twstd is actually a DJ Cafe, famous for its DJ contests, occasionally mental opening hours, and the big-time outdoor parties they throw on Queen’s Night and Day. But you can also go here on a quiet Wednesday night for a few beers, sit on the benches on the street and watch other people pass by. It’s kinda nice.

The interior of Twstd is very modern in the way that it anticipates the Nineties revival that is undoubtedly soon to come. There’s funky, brightly coloured sofa benches that are sort of round and winding along the walls.

Twisted, in fact. (Ha. Ha.) But like at

Beer price: €2.20 for a vaasje (Dommelsch).

Emergency food: The snack bar round the corner does ‘special hot dogs’.

Special interior feature: A little window between the ladies’ toilets and the mens’.

Predominant shoe type: Converse. Adidas.

Typically ordered drink: Becks—to escape the evil Dommelsch headache.

Smoking situation: Two long tables outside.

Tune of the night: Techno stuff.

Mingling factor: Low. State of toilets near closing time: Apart from the fact that you nearly fall into the DJ booth every time you try to get there, there’s nothing negative to report.

so many places these days, nobody is actually sitting inside, so there’s a constant battle over the outside seating going on. As it gets later, the need to sit vanishes and everybody just stands around on the small part of the pavement that is in front of the door.

A girl points at the entrance next to Twstd. ‘Have you noticed,’ she says to her friend, ‘there’s people coming out of there constantly! What is this place? A brothel? A crackhouse? They just won’t stop coming out of that door! Reminds me of The Settlers of Catan, where you can build these little houses, and once you’ve finished, there’s these little people coming out of them incessantly. Little people with blonde hair and large teeth.’

She might have gone on to say some more, but unfortunately the evening is quite abruptly ended by the barman, who comes outside and starts taking the chairs away. Complaints are being uttered: ‘We got the last round like, two minutes ago! Why didn’t you warn us?’ But he has no mercy since he probably needs his after-shift cigarette. Nevermind: for some lucky people on this terrace, the night will continue in being offered a lift on a boat by some random passers-by on Stadhouderskade. But that’s another story and shall be told another time. In general, it might be a good idea to come back on one of those nights when they’re open till seven. Or so.___

21

22

Amsterdam Weekly_7-13 August 2008

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Jobs Wanted ified and/or experienced Visit our website: BookSpanish translators. Inter- ENGLISH HAIRDRESSER ing.com/jobs OR send your ested? Please send your CV English hairdresser looking CV to: work@Booking.com to: gabriela@adamsrecruit- for a job in a salon in AmsDO YOU ENJOY WRITING ment.com terdam or Haarlem. 18 years ABOUT TOURISM? BookITALIAN Wanted: Italian experience, all aspects of ing.com is looking for talnative speakers for TomTom! hairdressing to high stanented Native Hungarian, With technical affinity and dard. Can work in a fast movRomanian & Czech Transexperience in customer sup- ing salon. Please email me lators to work in our Amsport you are the person we for details. mizzle@live.co.uk terdam office! Visit our weblook for. Good English com- PROFESIONAL PAINTER site: Booking.com/jobs OR munication skills and availI’m moving to Holland in earsend your CV to: work@Bookability for at least a year are a ly September and will be looking.com must! Interested? Call 06ing for work. I have 12 years UNDUTCHABLES AMS- 46190252/e-mailusyourupdatTERDAMInternational Sales ed CV: tomtom@asauitzendCoordinators; Italian, Arabic, bureau.

German and Russian native FRENCH:TomTom cherche speakers Order Management des Français! You have techRepresentative; Swedish, Dan- nical affinity and like to give ish native speakers Amster- customers remote support. dam@undutchables.nl You have excellent English

Eyecandy for your palace

UNDUTCHABLES AMSTERDAM Junior &Senior Corporate Accountant: Fluent English speaker (French would be a plus) Reserva-

experience in high end painting and wallpaper hanging.

If anyone has any openings in there company or knows of anyone I’d realy appreciate hearing about it. paintpropainting@yahoo.com

HOUSING ROOM FOR RENTIn shared appartment. Location: close to vondelpark, Period: August and September, Price: 300 euro’s all incl. tel. nr. 0642774518 NICE ROOM To rent for a week from the 14th of august till 21. Close to vondelpark, nice view on the garden. Price 100e. Call 0031 640 778487 STUDIO IN THE CENTRE Studio appartment opposite the Central Station, 750 euros per month.Call 06 557 648 61 62SQM APARTMENT OOSTLovely 1 bed furnished apartment in Amsterdam Oost. Separate living and dining room (used as 2nd bed for sharers). Close to Muiderport station and local amenities. 15 mins cycle to centre. 1100 pm, deposit rqd.

Available Aug 6 for 6 months, poss. longer term.

TEMP.RENT Nice room in Amsterdam-Sud (6mnth)No internet available call Judith 0647257969 VISIT BERLIN ?!?Fabulous apartment with spectacular view over Alex-platz in Berlin.

Close to the sightseeings, trendy stores and funky restaurants and bars. Fully equiped, comfortable for 2 , max 4 people. From 55,per night. Website: www.missfish.net/alex econtact: bartdelouwere@gmail.com / 0651777199 VACATION IN MAUI!Come to our place in Maui! http:// goodelifemaui.com/Site/Goo de_Life_Maui.html

Housing Wanted ACCOMODATION WANTED I am looking for a place to live in Amsterdam between End August and Early February 09 looking to pay 400 - 500 a month please reply to email: gregorydavidking@yahoo.co.nz STUDIO OR ROOM I’m a non-smoking female looking for a studio or room for max 500 Euros per month.

Tidy and responsible. Please call 0630244955 SHARED FLAT OR ROOM I am a young full time working (educ.field) boy looking for a room in a shared flat in a’dam starting 1st sept. Shared flat experienced also interested in a single room. firstseconds@gmail / 06 1932 1800 STUDENT NEEDS HOUSE I am a Student from the US and I am planning a trip to

communication skills and are committed for at least a year!

Interested? Call 06-46190252 or e-mail your updated CV and cover letter: tomtom@

Find what you are looking for: www.amsterdamweekly.nl

Amsterdam Weekly_7-13 August 2008

S E RV I C E

23

WEEKLY CLASSIFIEDS Europe. I’d like to find some kind apartment/house to rent during my stay. I plan on staying from anywhere from 3-6 months. I’m very relaxed and easy to get along with. Willing to live along or with someone. bjm5111@psu.edu

daan1@hotmail.co.uk

AMSTERDAM OOST Spacious room near Oosterpark available now for 2 weeks until August 23. 200 euro all incl. Big apartment with balcony, share with 2 professional, easy going xpats. IdeAPARTMENT WANTED I al for short term. 0634712510, am a young lady who will be 0634712506 moving to Amsterdam to study at the University of Other Spaces Amsterdam in September. I am looking for a 1 bedroom PHOTO STUDIO For amaapartment near the city cen- teur and professional photer or the Univeristy. Will be tographers. Can also be used staying for a period of 8 as meeting or gathering months to a year. edil26@hot- space. 100m2, 150/day. Possible to rent photo equipmail.com HOME FOR ME? I’m a ment. High ceilings, good, Finnish girl looking for home natural light and located on from 1st of September for at WG Plein, adjacent to Overleast 2 months. Max 400 toom. For appointment and e/month. Paying deposit and more info contact D.Ingel: rent in advance not a prob- 0628834224. lem. Please contact: elf_in_green@hotmail.com ROOM IN FLATSHARE.Italian male professional looking for a room in a friendly flatshare or studio flat from September or October. I am used to flatsharing, non smoker, clean, quiet and considerate to others. No registration needed, any area considered.

Please call on 06 25203976 or 020 6156838 Francesco.

LOOKING FOR A ROOM Young professional, reliable and friendly looking for an affordable and fairly priced room in Amsterdam. Please, contact me: 06-41769393 Denis 1 BD APT WANTEDFemale professional, non-smoker, quiet and tidy, seeks 1 BD apartment (not a single room) in Amsterdam. Preferably close to AmsCS or in Centrum, Oost, de Pijp, Zuid.

Long term (min. 1 year) from 1 September, registration.

Spreekt een beetje Nederlands. Please contact at eeebbr@yahoo.com or 06 22 52 I NEED A ROOMHello, I am Teresa Orazio a graphic designer and illustrator. I need a room in amsterdam (price max 400 incl.) because 15 September I have to leave my room in Zaandam. teresa.orazio@gmail.com PROFESSIONAL Medical research scientist looking for a houseshare from 1st September. I will be in town for a few days on 7th Ausgust, so please contact me on stuart.beattie@gmail.com if you would like to share a house with me.

NEW IN TOWN Room from August. I’m Mexican/Italian photographer looking for a fresh start in Amsterdam needs a room from August. German-SpanishEnglish-Italian speaker to share a clean friendly atmosphere with one/two professionals: up to 500. Contact me 0622679045.

Shared Housing CENTRAL A'DAM.Jordaan.

Great Flatshare! Dble bdrm for 1 person in a great 2 bed, 2 floor apt, sharing with me, mid 30’s very easy going expat guy. Modern, fully furnished, w/less internet. Will suit working, tidy, responsible person.

675 p/m incl. pls send details about yourself ASAP to: jor-

speeds. Lessons (6x) take place at the ABC Treehouse, in the center of Amsterdam.

First lesson: September 18th.

More information: patricia@patriciaribas.com WRITER'S WORKSHOPS! The Master Class Series – workshops designed to help you master your craft in fiction, publishing, poetry, novel, screenwriting, & more!

Free open days: Aug 16 & 30 at The English Bookshop.

Info: www.wordsinhere.com

have a simple conversation! call Hans for more info (020) 7757709 or 0644664254 EXCELLENT DUTCHProficiency in conversation with solid base of pronunciation, grammar & spelling/BEGIN. GROUP Fri.3 Oct, 19.0021.00, 12 ph/INTERM.GROUP 12 Aug, Tues.19:00-21:00, 12 ph/small groups/www.excellentdutch.nl/ Also private lessons & on-line & intensive courses all through the year.

Looking For Languages WWW.LEARNDUTCH.COM ! ! ! Dutch the natural way.

Online exercises. Interactive, practical and hands on !!! information@learnPC SERVICE & DESIGNPC dutch.com. & Laptop service and repair, FRENCH LESSONS I’m an windows networking and experienced French teachexchange server install. er who lives in Amsterdam.

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COURSES

DUTCH-IN-COMPANYLost for words at the coffee machine? Dutch-in-company offers Dutch language courses at the office. Your office.

Contact info@dutchincompany.com or visit www.dutchSINGING LESSONSOn Prin- incompany.com for more sengracht, Jordaan. Classical information. voice training, breathing tech- THIEVING MAGPIE BOOKniques, vocalization, etc. For STORE ?gA book must be beginners and advanced. Indi- the ax for the frozen sea withvidual and group lessons. From in us.?h „Ÿ Franz Kafka, letclassic to jazz or pop all styles. ter to Oskar Pollak, 27 JanReasonable prices + free intro- uary 1904. Access to axes at duction lesson. For more info The Thieving Magpie Bookcall Michael on 0618117754 store, 1e Bloemdwarsstraat or ajara77@yahoo.com.

15, Amsterdam. www.thievPHOTOGRAPHY COURSES ingmagpie.nl We run courses and workIMPROVE YOUR DUTCH! shops for beginners and expePrivate classes, small groups, rienced photographers alike.

Five day workshops and inten- intensive courses, conversasive courses lasting several tion, all levels, starting every weeks cover areas from stu- week, professional approach, dio lighting for beginners to Vijzelgracht 53C, linktaaldigital capture with camera studio@gmail.com, call Anja movements for profession- for more info 0641339323 als. info@thefotofactory.nl. DUTCH COURSES New WWW.LEARNDUTCH.COM evening courses starting in ! ! ! Dutch the natural way. Sep., Centre of A’dam. 200Online exercises. Interactive, 250 for 20 hrs. Visit www.merpractical and hands on !!! infor- cuurtaal.nl or call 693 4250. mation@learndutch.com.

DE TAALSTRAAT EveryDRAWING AND PAINTING Summer workshops by professional artist, various techniques, all styles, from scratch to painting with oils. Contact joneiselin@hetnet.nl.

PHOTOGRAPHY COURSE Learn the basics of photography such as composition, lighting, angle of view as well as how to work with different appertures and shutter

thing you always wanted to do but.... Dutch in 10 weeks, 2 hrs a week (15 euro) Small groups, focus on speaking and understanding with a sense of humour. After this you can

ATTENTION AMERICANS I am an American looking to relocate to Amsterdam due to obvious political action the United States is currently undertaking. Can someone give me some helpfull hints as to living in Amsterdam. desistohater@yahoo.com.

RADIO FREE AMSTERDAM Radio interviewer looking for interesting people/project to create unscripted interviews with. www.martyninterviews.com info@martyninterviews.com

Groups & Clubs WELCOME TO AMSTERDAM Are you one the hundreds new expats just arrived in A’dam? Still struggling to find your way? Join JCI. Get the opportunity to quickly make new friends and contacts. Get involved into great projects and socialize with other likeminded, international young professionals. For more info: www.jciai.nl BABIES AND TODDLERSBring your bored babies and toddlers (up to 4 years) to Robbeburg Playgroup, Jekerstraat 84, any weekday morning from 10 until 12. Sessions from 5 euros. www.robbeburg.comSpace also available for children's parties.

EXPAT IRISH GROUPInterested in meeting Irish people in A’dam? We are a recently formed club and meet regularly. Easy to just come along and join in. Visit our site: http://expatirish.meetup.com/ 60/ for more details about our next events.

NOTICES ZOMER ACADEMIE 1daagse seminar: ‘Meditatie & Visualisatie’ Gebruik je mentale kracht: versterk, versimpel, focus en beleef.

17 aug in Amsterdam Informatie & opgave: 038-3769739 of www.zomeracademie.info GUITARLESSONS Guitar and Bass lessons at your place!

In English and Dutch. Acoustic and electric, all styles, all levels. Also song writing – vocal coaching- music theory. Email: djjazzcat@gmail.com

How to submit a classified ad • Submit classifieds at www.amsterdamweekly.nl/classifieds

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Ads are free, space permitting Deadline: Monday at midnight

Win tickets to Arcade Fire: www.amsterdamweekly.nl