Zonder Meer

Lucie, a young girl of five years old, is trying to make sense of the mysterious chaos at her campsite. A campsite in the summer holidays, aimless days spent in the shade of trees. Sunlight is glittering on the lake, but nobody is allowed to swim here. A boy has disappeared and may have drowned. Lucie is trying to understand what is going on around her. How long can you hold your breath? Director Meltse Van Coillie has previously spoken about how he came up with the film's premise. "A child playing dead: a fraught and yet relatable scene. It is an innocent attempt to provoke reaction, to see how credibly one can pretend and to test the limits of one’s own physicality. Indeed, it’s a way to gain understanding of the fragile human body. As the most passive of games, this is the first encounter with mortality. What does it mean not to breathe, not to be alive? "It is this simple scene that sparked the idea for a short film. With Zonder Meer, I wanted to make a film in which a tragedy unfolds in the margins, even out of frame. By witnessing a drama through the eyes of a child, I would like to give the viewers an opportunity to experience it through the perception of someone who does not yet understand it in a dramatic way. "Shot in between two lockdowns, we were challenged with a lot of restrictions. But restrictions often gift a great deal of liberty. By making straightforward narrative and formalistic choices, I aim to create a space for the viewer to wander."