Internationally acclaimed filmmaker Heddy Honigmann (70) passed away

Filmmaker Heddy Honigmann died on Saturday at the age of 70, after “a long battle with MS and cancer”, her family announced on Sunday morning. Relatives told ANP news agency that Honigmann died in Amsterdam “in the presence of her loved ones”.

Honigmann, who was born in 1951 in the Peruvian capital Lima, became one of the most important film makers in the Netherlands. In total she made around forty films, including the feature films chimeras (1987) in Bye (1995). Well-known documentaries include The Natural Love (1993), The Underground Orchestra (1997) in Crazy† With the latter title, about the experiences of Dutch peacekeepers and their memories of the war zones where they were active, she won a Golden Calf in 1999 for the Best Long Documentary. She also received the same award for her documentary Foreverset in the Père-Lachaise cemetery in Paris.

In 2016 Honigmann won the oeuvre prize of the Prince Bernhard Cultuurfonds. Honigmann’s work has also been acclaimed abroad, and her films have been shown at international festivals. In 2003 a retrospective of her work was shown at the MoMa in New York.

Latest autobiographical documentary

Honigmann, whose father moved to Peru after surviving the Mauthausen concentration camp, studied film at the Centro Sperimentale di Cinematografia in Rome. She then came to the Netherlands in the late 1970s, where her oeuvre was created. During the production of her films, she left a lot of room for improvisation, she talked about the making process in interviews. On NRC Honigmann said late last year that she was making documentaries to answer questions she had. And during filming, other questions often arose: “It’s about discovering something I don’t know myself.” Music played an important role in her work and she returned to Peru several times.

Also read: Heddy Honigmann: ‘There are a number of things that make me want to live’

The last documentary Honigmann was able to work on – although she stated she had many other ideas – was about her own life. She traveled again to her native country and met in There is no path people who had been important in her life. With that autobiographical character, her last released film is an exception in her oeuvre; all her previous work is about others. NRC mentioned There is no path in a review “not an ego document but an egoless document”, from which an image arises “from a warm woman who is more interested in people than in political systems”. For example, Honigmann’s previous documentaries have been about centenarians, people with assistance dogs and musicians.

It had been known for some time that Honigmann was terminally ill. In the interview with NRC last year, she said that despite her illness, she still had plans to make new films. She leaves behind a husband, son and stepson.

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