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Dutch features The Hero and Falko, Letter of Fire get €1.8 Million production funding

Press release, 8 May 2014:

New Dutch features films The Hero and Falko, Letter of Fire are selected for production funding today within the framework of Telescope, the annual collaboration between Dutch Public broadcaster NPO, CoBO and the Netherlands Film Fund.

The Hero will be directed by Antoinette Beumer (Loft). The film, a thriller was written by her sister Marjolein Beumer, and is produced by Millstreet Films. What’s more, it will star third sister and X-men actress Famke Janssen. This will be the first time all three sisters have worked together on a film and it is also the first starring role for Janssen in a Dutch feature.

Falko, Letter of Fire is directed by Dennis Bots (Cool Kids Don’t Cry). The screenwriter is Karen van Holst Pellekaan and the film is produced by Bijker Film & TV.

Under the terms of Telescope an amount of € 1.8 Million per film is granted, focusing on Dutch quality films that aim at reaching a wide audience.

The Hero
Director: Antoinette Beumer
Writer: Marjolein Beumer, based on the novel by Jessica Durlacher
Producer: Millstreet Films
Distributor: Independent Films
Broadcaster: VPRO
Co-producer: FBO (BE)
Logline: Based on the novel by Jessica Durlacher, The Hero follows a Holocaust survivor who seeks revenge after masked men break into her house and shoot her husband and she is assaulted in the woods.


Falko, Letter of Fire
Director: Dennis Bots
Writer: Karen van Holst Pellekaan
Producer: Bijker Film & TV
Broadcaster: NTR
Distributor: Dutch Filmworks
Co-producer: Flying Moon Filmproduktion GmbH (Ger)
Logline : Printer’s son Falko (12) unwittingly finds himself at the centre of the hunt for an important letter written by Martin Luther, for which his father was arrested after printing it. Threatened by the Inquisition and helped by Marieke (12), an orphan girl, he must race against time to save his father from death as a heretic.

Advisors from the Netherlands Film Fund and a representative of the Dutch broadcasters unanimously agreed this selection from 8 submitted projects. Telescope is a project of NPO, CoBO and the Netherlands Film Fund and makes a contribution of € 1.8 Million per film. Over the past two years films including Wiplala (Tim Oliehoek), The Silent Force (Paul Verhoeven), Michiel de Ruyter (
Roel Reiné) and Public Works (Joram Lürsen) have been selected within the framework of this project .

For more information:
Netherlands Film Fund
Jonathan Mees, Communications
Telephone: +31205707681
E-mail: [email protected]
www.filmfonds.nl