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| A mysterious modern structure, majestic elephants and a boy with a quizzical look in his eyes make up this dark and quizzical poster for Dominique Standaert's Hop |
A super-intelligent boy from Burundi, Africa gets into trouble, when a banal problem makes his father get arrested as an illegal immigrant by Belgian authorities, and he himself finds shelter in the home of an anarchist couple.
Hop is written by Rémi Hatzfeld (Le Navetteur (1985), director), Olivier Malley (Papillon & Mamillon (2005, TV-series)) and debuting co-writer/director Dominique Standaert (Eau (1997, short)).
It is a beautifully photographed (by cinematographer Rémont Fromont (Eliot (2013, short))) saga that explores power structures with a critical eye pointed towards Belgian authorities in particular, with an enormously charming boy in the central part, Kalomba Mbuyi. But what's symptomatic of this typically left-oriented echo chamber type plot; the 'foreigner' is exceptionally intelligent, domestically superb, well behaved, eternally sweet and understanding (below the surface he appears to be a sprouting homosexual), and across from him; the authorities and the Belgian 'every-man' worker are merely dumb and unfair! Underlying reasons for their positions or any perspectives on enrichment immigration are clearly not worthy of these filmmakers' precious time or attention.
That the boy's conflict nearly results in a terrorism bombing of a tourist attraction (watch the film to learn how) and a dam system are also disturbing facts that the narrative trio obviously think cannot be held against him. Despite qualities, Hop is a prime example of tiring polemics turned into a film.
Watch a trailer for the film here
Cost: Unknown
Box office: Unknown (Danish gross 119k $)
= Uncertain
[Hop premiered 8 October (International Film Festival Gent, Belgium) and runs 106 minutes. Shooting took place in Belgium, including in Brussels. It was the first Belgian film to be shot on an HD camera. Gross numbers from the film's main markets, Belgium, France and the Netherlands are regrettably unavailable: It sold 10k tickets in Denmark, coming to approximately 119k $ . It was nominated for 2 European Film awards. Standaert returned with Formidable (2007). Mbuyi did not return in front of a camera; Jan Decleir (Ay Ramon! (2015)) returned in Brush with Fate (2003, TV movie) and theatrically in Rosenstrasse (2003). 455 IMDb users have given Hop a 6.9/10 average rating.]
What do you think of Hop?
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