The sea that thinks (De Zee die Denkt)
Director/Cinematographer/Screenplay:
Gert de Graaff
This bracingly
experimental piece of work seems literally to make itself up
as it goes along. The sea that thinks
focuses on a screenwriter working on a film called, well, The
Sea that Thinks. As the writer puts words down
on the page, the events he transcribes unfold in his "real"
life. Or is he merely recording the details of his life as they
unfold? Cheeky and audacious visual effects set a surreal tone
as the writer finds his apartment filling with water
and the titular sea striving to become a tree. Meanwhile, his
wife upbraids him for vainly living his wonted writer's
life while baring himself in the trappings of the ever-changing
computer age. Up-and-coming director
Gert de Graaf treads a thin, metaphysical line with this keenly
observed, exquisitely visual exploration of how art
influences life. Or is it the other way around?
Notes:
De Graaf, a non-linear video specialist in Holland, spent more
than ten years developing the pyrotechnics
for this amazing film. (100 min.)
Ufilm.org,
26-4-2001