The Moon Is Broken (2010)

Directed by: Arno Dierickx | 10 minutes | short film, drama, fantasy | Actors: Daan Schuurmans, Ollie Becker, Elisa Breuger

Although he had been working on the stage for years and made his TV debut in 1996 in the popular youth series ‘Fort Alpha’, Daan Schuurmans only really broke through with the general public as the power-hungry and insufferable heir Anton Noordermeer in the drama series. ‘Westenwind’ in 1999. His crude one-liners made him especially popular with young people, which earned him a starring role in the summer films ‘Costa!’ (2001) and ‘Full Moon’ (2002). After that, things started to roll for Schuurmans, who alternates roles in popular genres on TV and the silver screen with theater work and demanding roles such as that of the young Prince Bernhard in ‘Bernhard, scoundrel of Orange’. Schuurmans likes to play in youth films and series such as ‘Polleke’ (2004) and ‘The letter for the king’ (2008) and can now be seen in the moving short film ‘De Maan is Broken’ (2010) by the Flemish director Arno dierickx.

Schuurmans plays a father who is visibly having a hard time raising his son (Ollie Becker). Something is going on in this household, you can feel it immediately. When Dad tries to get little Jack into bed, he struggles. Jack doesn’t want to sleep yet, because ‘the moon is broken’. He points out. Dad, meanwhile, has had enough and pushes the bed out the window. Together they fly through the air. The bed floats and rocks and even lands on the moon. Finally, there’s mommy too. But why doesn’t she say anything? Dierickx uses drawn animation to shape little Jack’s fantasy world. The animation is – certainly by the current standard – quite simple, but effective. The drawings are not an end in themselves, but a means to achieve the intended effect.

‘The moon is broken’ is a moving fantasy about saying goodbye. Behind the seemingly simple story of a father who puts his son to bed, there is a sea of ​​emotions, which are only released in the last few minutes. You know there is more to it, but the impact of the closing scenes is no less. Suddenly everything falls into place. The magical-realistic touch that Dierickx adds in the very last image is perhaps just a bit too much of a good thing, but it does not detract from the scene that precedes it. Because it comes in like a bomb. Whether you see it coming or not.