Academy Award Nomination Submission Best Foreign Language Film from Netherlands: ‘Tonio’ by Paula van der Oest

Three time Oscar submitted filmmaker Paula van der Oest, whose film “Zus and Zo” was nominated for Best Foreign Language Film by the Academy in 2002 has brought “Tonio” to Los Angeles for Oscar consideration.

This beautiful jewel touches all our lives as we watch a couple struggle to prevent their lives from being caught in a downward spiral of sorrow as they mourn the loss of their only son.

The question of how an artist transforms real life tragedy into art is a key issue of art, though for us, the consumers of art, what we take home with us is the story itself and how it affects and perhaps even transforms us. The well-known Dutch author A.F. Th van de Heijden has written around twenty books, all documenting his life. When his eighteen year old son was hit and killed by a car while riding his bike home one late night, he found he no longer had a purpose for writing and, in fact, he could no longer write. But he also found that he knew nothing else except writing.

In my interview with director Paula van der Oest, we discussed the writer’s cerebral need to express emotions on paper, how this writer and his wife dealt in their separate ways with heartbreaking grief and were able to return to each other after finding their own solutions to moving on.

This film resonates with two other films I have recently seen, “A Week and a Day” from Israel (also a chamber piece but combined with rock n roll) and “Little Secret” from Brazil. All are about the death of a child and how the parents deal with such a tragedy. Each offers a nugget of solace to those who have ever suffered any loss by death (everyone). As movies, they create an audience which unites as a community of support for all those who grieve.

Read my review of “A Week and a Day”.

Read my interview with the director of “Little Secret”, David Schurmann.

SL: Why did you choose such a difficult story to make into a movie?

Like most parents, I felt uncomfortable about reading A.F.Th van der Heijden’s Tonio. I have a son who is almost 18 and who goes out a lot, also late at night, and I have often lain awake waiting for him to get home safely. It’s a truism, but no less true for that: losing a child is in all probability the worst thing that can happen to a parent. It’s something you don’t want to imagine in great detail: it’s simply too painful and challenging. But in the novel Tonio, this is unavoidable. I don’t believe it’s possible to get closer than this to such a devastating event — the word ‘event’ doesn’t even comeclose to describing it.

I wasn’t originally planning to make a film of this wonderful but horrific novel. Not least because it would mean filming my own nightmare. Also, it is an intensely personal book. But it turned out that it is precisely my own resistance to the subject that drew me to it. The novel Tonio is far from a banal reportage on the loss of a child. I have tried to make a film that has the same complexity and layered nature as the book. A film that hurts, but at the same time offers solace.

It is a great opening to see the busy youth and to segue into the silent room. And then to hear the name of the husband called, “Adri!!” words with a quiet panic. And it is heartbreaking to see the baby being born as they say farewell to their son who is unconscious.

There are two flashbacks to the mother’s pregnancy. It is hard to capture all the detailed emotional nuances, grief and mourning jumble past an present, and there is no future…The film is also about what time does. About how now and then can flow together; how time gets stretched out and then squeezed together. The writer in the film tries to hold back time–to turn back time. In vain. The film starts with Tonio’s death, but during the film he comes to life through memories. Tonio will always be in his parents’ lives. Time has become fluid. We jump back and forth in time, there is no logic — everything is driven by the emotions of the main characters.

I noticed the writer used an old electric typewriter in the movie.

He still only uses that. He had 150 typewriter ribbons. When they are gone, he will use a computer to write.

The wife does not seem to have an occupation…

She did not work at that time but she is a writer. She is very strong, she knows herself and she is supportive of her husband as a writer.

How did you edit this collage of time periods?

The producers gave us all the time necessary. There were no deadlines. dTo make a good movie, you must have time to edit, and editing is very intuitive. Every version was very different. The editing was associative, not in the order of the script.

I have worked for years with my crew. The editor and I share the same tastes and know each other very well.

I was surprised to see a man with a kippa, a Jewish man and I wondered why. The relationships of the other people were not clear at first. But as the story unfolded, it became clearer that Mir’s mother an and father were divorced and that they were Jewish.

We cut out many side stories in order to focus o the two or three people to make it an intense drama, a chamber piece. That is why you did not know at first who the peripheral characters were.

When the son goes with his grandfather to where he is served meals and makes photographs of the people …

It was not planned to have photographs of the people, but they were beautiful survivors. The DoP siad ,”Let’s let each one look into the lens and photograph them. They were all extras. We had not seen them before. They were fragile and strong really for they had survived so much. The Center was real; called Beth Shalom and they serve the older Jewish community.

The search for Jenny, whom the parents think was their son’s first love turned into a sort of false turn.

Yes they thought that she was part of his life but found out in fact that she was not and the friend Goscha was in fact the important one. Jenny was a “McGuffin” to keep them going, to talk about, to track down. They projected everything onto Jenny and then they find out it was in fact Goscha their son was with.

The music the husband wrote to and the music the son liked worked as sort of counterweights to each other.

Music was very important to the real Tonio van der Heijden. His mother gave me his I-pod, and thanks to friends I was able to look at Tonio’s music account. I used his favorite numbers on the soundtrack. He particularly loved electronic music, underground-style music. This gives Tonio’s scenes exactly the right energy. The ending song was one of his favorites, “Who know what tomorrow will bring…”

How the father had to imagine every scene in a non-intellectual way was fascinating as a way to see how he dealt with his loss.

The final scenes of the father coming to terms with his son’s death were really the screenwriter’s interpretation of the book.

How did the Dutch audience react to the film?

In the Q&A many related in their own way to the movie. It connects them to what they know and gives them a feeling of not being alone.

How did the author like the movie?

The writer and his wife watched the film in a small screening room. The producer and I were outside. When it was over, they did not leave for a long time. Finally they came out and hugged me and said, “Thank you, it was a wonderful piece of art.”. They originally agreed to let me make the film because they wanted to extend the life of their son who had died six years before.

Thank you for making such a beautiful work. I hope for your success and the success of your film!