The film begins with a short sequence at the seaside, where a young girl together with her father admires the horizon at dusk. But they don’t get to see the sea light yet and Lena (Saar Rogiers) gets tired, so they postpone their plan for another time. We are catapulted into the present and see Leena as a sporty active teenager who is taking part in a competition in her own dinghy (a small sailboat), in her face you can literally see the love for the sea. Her family and friends cheer her on the beach and in the end she receives a golden medal and her best friend Kaz (Dunia Elwaleed) also gets an award. Reason enough to celebrate the event once again in a cozy round in a bar until late in the evening.
It is probably one of the last moments together with Lena’s father, because in the next scene we are on a boat and the camera pans past several urns to a photo of some men, including Lena and Kaz’s fathers. The fathers were fishermen and when they went to sea one day, they never returned. For Lena, this breaks down a world, even if she doesn’t immediately let on to others. Then a powerful jolt passes through the entire boat they are all on, and Lena is convinced she has seen a large shadow that has passed under the boat. During the final funeral service on shore, she records the shadow as a sketch on a piece of paper. Her thoughts are interrupted by a loud voice from outside. Her eyes land on a boy in an octopus costume advertising a marine museum and this is not entirely hidden from her best friend, who promptly makes a little fun of the boy.
Over the next few days, Lena can’t let go of the thought that a monster has obviously killed her father, and so she goes to the sea again and again to look for more traces. When one evening a large wooden beam lands in front of her feet and she inspects it more closely, she sees it as another sign of the monster’s existence. She then gets her final confirmation at the marine museum, where she meets the octopus boy again. Vincent (Sverre Rous) confirms to her that there is a larger number of non-native fish that are increasingly appearing in the North Sea due to climate change.
The only one who is not so enthusiastic about Lena’s convictions is her mother, and when she realizes that Vincent and Lena were secretly on the ill-fated boat to collect DNA samples, the two get into an argument. This is enough incentive for Lena to prove the existence of the monster. She finally convinces Vincent and Kaz to help her in her search, and so the three of them embark on the final search together, although Kaz sets an important condition for Lena before the journey out to sea.
Conclusion:
Zeevonk looks for a rather unusual way of depicting a coping with grief. For Lena the death of her father is incomprehensible and there is not really anyone who talks to her openly about what happened. Obviously, some things would rather be kept quiet, but Lena is no longer a small child and sets out on her own path to cope with the difficult situation. She must defeat her inner monster by herself to finally find peace.
Actors: Saar Rogiers, Dunia Elwaleed, Sverre Rous, Valentijn Dhaenens, Hilde De Baerdemaeker
Director: Domien Huyghe
More about the movie: https://www.berlinale.de/de/2023/programm/202306940.html
