Melody Z

Trapped in the City of a Thousand Mountains

A new phenomenon of authentic Chinese rap has taken the internet by storm. But behind the unprecedented gains in popularity, there is a struggle for freedom of speech. Rappers are trying to figure out what they still can and cannot do after new censorship is announced.

Club Zeus

A group of professional 'host boys' work in a local club, where Chinese women come for company, attention and sometimes with the hope of finding love. The host boys are there to entertain, to give attention and to make sure that their customers return and spend more and more money. This is all about the illusion of a possible relationship, the illusion of friendship. With emotional addiction as a result. On their part most of the time, the host boys lose total control of their private life, as a result of all the lies and fake promises. They don't trust life, they don't believe in love anymore and cannot keep fake and truth from each other.

An Impossibly Small Object

A Dutch photographer (played by David Verbeek himself – also a talented photographer in real life) takes a picture of a girl in a parking lot in nighttime Taipei as she plays with her kite. The photo transports us into her life. She is eight years old and is about to lose her best friend, a boy from a wealthy family who is moving to America. Back in the Netherlands, the photographer is confronted with his own constant loneliness. The photo of the girl evokes memories of his own childhood, when he still felt at home somewhere.

Beat

The true story of two murders that shaped the lives of several college students who went on to become some of the most influential writers of the "Beat Generation."

How to Describe a Cloud

A young woman in Taipei is confronted with the blindness of her mother who is convinced she has a sixth sense. Shot with little facilities, but it is Verbeek’s most mature film - about uprooting, spirituality and modernity.

R U There

Jitze, a young professional video game player who travels the world competing in tournaments, unexpectedly witnesses an accident in Taipei.

Full Contact

Full Contact is a contemporary tale of a man trying to find new purpose in life after accidentally bombing a school through a remotely operated drone plane. Ivan, operating the plane from a far away air force base, has never been to the foreign countries of his attacks, nor has he ever touched the plane he uses to kill. Modern warfare keeps him safe and disconnected from his prey. However, after this incident Ivan's disconnectedness starts to apply to everything in his life. He is overwhelmed by feelings of guilt that he is unable to process.

Dead & Beautiful

A group of young and spoiled rich kids turn into vampires after a night out, changing the course of their lives and driving a wedge between them all.

Shanghai Trance

Young Dutch director made an (almost) entirely Chinese film. In a city where everything is new, an outsider is in any case no more out of place than the locals. Cinematographic portrait of modern life in the mega-city of Shanghai is made up of three separate stories about dreams and loves of twentysomethings.

The Wolf, the Fox, and the Leopard

When a girl raised by wolves is found in the woods, she must learn to forge her own path as those around her try to exploit her for their own purposes.

Safe.Self.Sense

Through dance, image and sound, the work explores how the pandemic has affected our perception of safety, identity and senses.

Toyland

On a winter morning, a mother goes to waken her son Heinrich; his bed is empty. She leaves her flat to find him. The neighbors' door, with a Star of David painted on it, is ajar, the furnishings in disarray, the family gone. She asks passersby, runs to the police then on to the rail yard. Flashbacks show that Heinrich and the neighbors' son Paul are six years old and best friends. Paul's family's deportation is expected soon; Heinrich's mother tells her son that they're going to Toyland. Heinrich wants to go with them, has a bag packed, and listens for their departure. His mother realizes he's joined them, and her resolve becomes more urgent. Will she arrive in time to save Heinrich?