A Trailer For Dutch Epic NOVA ZEMBLA

The biggest buzz currently in the Dutch film industry is the upcoming premiere of Reinout Oerlemans' sophomore feature "Nova Zembla", a large-scale historical drama which is also the first Dutch movie to be filmed with the new 3D technology.

The story concerns the true-life travel of Willem Barentsz, who in 1596 tried to find a shorter shipping route to India by going North over Russia through uncharted waters. The ship and its crew got surprisingly far, managing to round the Northern tip of the island Nova Zembla before getting irrevocably stuck in the ice. Plagued by hunger, extreme cold and attacks by polar bears, the men made it through the winter by demolishing their wooden ship and using the planks to build a large shelter on the island. When spring arrived the survivors demolished the shelter, built a smaller boat and managed to travel back to The Netherlands. The script is based on the extensive travel journals written by the expedition's cartographer Gerrit de Veer.

By all means "Nova Zembla" is a very risky production, but its director Reinout Oerlemans seems to be turning everything he touches into gold lately. His first film as a director "Stricken" was hugely successful, and his gamble to produce "New Kids Turbo" also paid off. In any case he has everyone talking about the movie already, not in the least because Gerrit de Veer's love-interest is played by the almost ridiculously gorgeous Dutch supermodel Doutzen Kroes. Indeed, the trailer strongly suggests Gerrit survived the ordeal because he had something worth coming back for (the poster's tagline even reads "Love Never Freezes"...).

We'll keep you posted on this film which will premiere next month. Until the, here is the new trailer.