On the opening night of the Venice Film Festival, the stately Sala Grande plat Gents resounded. Thanks to Johan Heldenbergh, who plays a Flemish sea captain in the opening film Comandante.
Lieven Trio31 August 2023, 18:00
Wednesday, August 30. A terrace with sea view, on the Lido of Venice. In the distance, the last thunderclouds slowly drift away, just in time to give the 80th edition of the Venice Film Festival a dry start. The Italian war film Comandante will soon open the festivities, and in addition to the Italian star actor Pierfrancesco Favino, our compatriot Johan Heldenbergh (56) will also be on the red carpet. He plays a foul-mouthed, shaggy-bearded sea captain in the film.
Cleaned up, Heldenbergh appears at my table, wearing a suit jacket and holding two espressos. Soon he will speak to the international press, and then it is almost time for the opening gala. It will be Heldenbergh’s first time to see Comandante – journalists were shown the film in the morning. And so it is he who is the first to take the piers out of my nose. “Does the film come across as right or left?”, he especially wants to know.
Pierfrancesco Favino plays Salvatore Todaro, an Italian naval officer under Mussolini.Image RV
Comandante is doing something pretty risky. Main character Salvatore Todaro was an Italian naval officer under Mussolini, but is portrayed as a hero by director Edoardo De Angelis. At the same time, the film is clearly set up as a commentary on contemporary Italy and the harsh immigration policies of Giorgia Meloni’s far-right government.
The film shows how in 1940 Todaro fished the crew of a Belgian cargo ship, which he had just shot to pieces, out of the water and brought it safely ashore with his own submarine. The message: even a fascist commander was human enough to help drowning people, while today the coastguard abandons sinking sloops off the Italian coast and politically punishes NGOs that save the lives of migrants.
Lower abdomen
Heldenbergh is relieved that this message can be found in the film, and praises De Angelis’ approach: “I think it is very intelligent how he speaks the language of Italy’s underbelly: the film brims with patriotism, with songs, pasta , and that one sentence: “We helped you because we are Italians.” But that is all used to remind Italians of what the real Italy is: being hospitable, reaching out, helping the other.”
Comandante may be an Italian film, but as captain of the Belgian ship Kabalo, Heldenbergh only speaks Dutch in the film, or rather: flat Ghent. A choice he made on his own, he says with a chuckle. “I thought that people in those days just spoke their own dialect, even though they were captains of a ship. So I went looking for the oldest Ghent I knew, that of my grandparents. And since the director did not speak Dutch, I could basically do what I wanted. (laughs) I wanted to play that captain really big too – at one point I literally grunted “arrr”, like that captain from The Simpsons. (laughs) It’s great that it’s still allowed in Italy, to play so big. In Flanders, people cannot tolerate that very well.”
But Heldenbergh does not suffer much from this: in Flanders, after all, he can hardly be seen in films or on TV. Since his international breakthrough with The Broken Circle Breakdown, the Oscar-nominated film by Felix van Groeningen, his film career has mainly taken place in France and Italy. “I am simply not asked in Flanders,” says Heldenbergh. “Since we recorded The Broken Circle in 2011, I only played in My father is a saucisse, De twelve and Cool Abdoul. That’s three roles in twelve years.”
Don’t coo
Why? Heldenbergh has his own guess. “I may not be the most sociable person… I have children, often sit at home and hardly go to premieres. I can’t coo either. By that I mean: hanging out after a movie and mucking about that I loved it so much. I can not do that. Everyone also knows that I have a tendency to depression, so maybe they fear that I will pass out in the middle of shooting a movie? While of course it doesn’t work that way. And yes, I also have some principles, with which I may have antagonized people. I am decidedly left-wing, and I will not keep my mouth shut about it.”
Johan Heldenbergh on the red carpet of the 80th Venice Film Festival.Image Photo News
“But I certainly don’t want to sound too negative,” he interrupts himself. “I am not frustrated about that, and I also enjoy the roles that I get to play abroad. I only regret that I can’t work with the velo more often, instead of by plane or train.” (laughs)
And then it’s time for Heldenbergh to start his big day. His beige suit is already waiting in his hotel room. “I had it made especially for Jessica Chastain’s wedding, with whom I starred in The Zookeeper’s Wife,” he smiles. “I didn’t even have a decent suit before. At Film Fest Gent in 2008 I once showed up in an ugly brown suit that still belonged to my character from Aanrijding in Moscou. (laughs) The next day there was an article in De Morgen in which your then journalist Wilfried Eetezonne complained about the lack of glamor on the red carpets in Flanders, with the following example: ‘Johan Heldenbergh, who appeared in the ugliest brown suit I have ever seen have.’” (laughs)
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2023-08-31 16:00:21
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