Beyond the Sea (2020)

Directed by: Anastasija Pirozenko | 25 minutes | short film, documentary

What do cities like Capelle aan den IJssel, Dronten, Hellevoetsluis, Emmen and Zeewolde have in common? They are planned cities, in other words, cities that have been preconceived by someone and designed on the basis of building plans. Emmen is one of the first planned cities in the Netherlands. Filmmaker Anastasija Pirozenko used this as a starting point for a special documentary.

‘Beyond the sea’, however, begins with a view of untouched nature. Dolmens, a lake, birds chirping. And then a title card that reads that a young Soviet writer, Valentina B, went to Europe in 1973 to research her debut, a science fiction novel. That book never came, but her notebook was found 40 years later. On the cover were the coordinates of Emmen.

What follows is the visual design of the notes in the booklet. An English-speaking voice-over says that she is surprised to have found the utopian island in the western world. As if she’d read about it but didn’t believe it really existed. This wonder city is an open, green city, with a village feel, according to the voice-over. Accompanied by images of a residential area in Emmen, where someone plays basketball, a woman plays with her dogs. On a lawn, bordered by trees, is a large white canvas, as if an open-air cinema is about to be organised. A residential area like this is very special.

Pirozenko elaborates on the population: many Serbian girls worked in the textile factories in the fifties and sixties and settled in one of the new residential areas. Decades later they still live in Emmen and the filmmaker gets them in front of the camera. Two older, Dutch men also come into the picture, but what their involvement exactly is remains a mystery. Most likely they had some part in the planning of the city, but the statements they make are left hanging in the air.

And so ‘Beyond the sea’ is above all a documentary that expresses a lot of ambition. Unfortunately, the intention of the filmmaker is not entirely clear. Does she want to prove that the fact of a planned society is outdated or never had a reason to exist? Is it a failed experiment and should the inhabitants of the Butterfly City just make do with the remains of it? The chosen form for this short documentary, made in the context of Teledoc Campus, is without doubt original, but due to the incoherence of the images, the filmmaker does not hit her target.