Beumer, whose credits include such hits as The Happy Housewife (2010) and Soof* (2013), is about to start a new job as Director of Original Series Benelux for streaming giant Netflix. That will give her huge influence. She will be commissioning and nurturing the best new filmmaking talent in the region - but she will not have time for her own films.

She starts with Netflix November 1. “I am not going to make anything else myself anymore,” Beumer declares of her decision give up writing and directing in favour of her new commissioning job. The role follows on from her work as director of scripted at Videoland.

Her “final” film, which will be released in Dutch cinemas by September Film at the end of the month, is based on her novel of the same title, published in 2018. The book tells the semi-autobiographical story of a young woman (played by Elise Schaap) who discovers that her seemingly stable life is built on lies. Her mother has just died. Her father has mental health problems and is institutionalised.

“First of all, I do not consider myself a writer. It was a big fight I had with myself. I felt… embarrassed. Every time I was writing sentences, I felt oh, this is ugly and pretentious. Do not pretend to be a writer! I was constantly fighting with my own demons. That was one thing that made it difficult,” Beumer says of her struggle to complete the book.

This was a story she had been trying to tell for a very long time. At one stage Beumer considered creating a stage play. At another moment, she thought about dealing with the very raw subject matter in a documentary. She also began pulling together ideas and scenes for a potential feature film. In the end, though, she decided a novel was the best format for it.

At first, she worked alone on the manuscript. She did not have an editor or a publisher and was not sure how the novel might turn out. “I wanted to work without any pressure.”

Nonetheless, midway through writing the book, Beumer sent it to Frans van Gestel, the producer who runs Topkapi Films. He immediately saw the cinematic potential and secured development funding for a film adaptation before the author had even completed it.

Having spent over two years working on the novel, Beumer was not sure she wanted to dive straight into a movie version. After all, this was an intense family psycho-drama based around her memories of her manic depressive father.

“First, I thought I am not going to do it so there is not going to be a film, but my husband [Maaik Krijgsman] is also a screenwriter,” Beumer notes. He told her that it would be “a waste” to abandon the film and volunteered to write the screenplay for her.

“It felt really safe that he offered to do it. He was very close to me while I was writing the book… we worked together finding the right way to tell the story and then we threw the book away. He started writing the script and we never opened the book anymore,” the director explains the adaptation process.

The father in the film is also seen as a younger man. He is a dashing, good looking airline pilot with plenty of swagger and charm. However, as an older man (played by Pierre Bokma), he is a truculent, embittered figure whose mental faculties are failing him.

“The father is so many persons in one. Obviously, he is confused and sick. He is mean and violent, sweet and heroic at the same time,” the director reflects. She speaks in awe of Bokma’s performance which shows the pathos and vulnerability in the character.

Beumer cast Elise Schaap as the adult daughter who does not even realise how traumatised she is by events in her past. What she liked about Schaap was her lightness and humour. This is a dark film but it still has its comedic moments. “Elise is a comedienne… she never did something like this before. This is the first time she dared to step in a role like this and I think she did it wonderfully. There is no other Eva in my mind.”

Bokma stayed in character and was deliberately aloof and offhand with Schaap. “He did not make her feel comfortable,” the director recalls of how the veteran actor deliberately kept his younger co-star on edge. Therefore Beumer decided to keep them apart, and they rehearsed separately.

Bokma took his part so seriously that he spent a day in a mental health facility pretending to be a patient. “He blended in very quickly. There was some confusion when somebody else who was there said she knew him from television.” The actor denied his own identity confusing the woman yet further.

The film itself has turned out just as Beumer hoped it would. And, no, she does not have any desire at present to direct another feature.

“I think as a filmmaker or an artist, everybody has only one story and they tell that story in all different ways. But it is one story! I have told this story now in a book and a film. For me there is no desire that is so burning that I think I have to make something myself,” the director declares.

My Father Is an Airplane was “a beautiful closure.” Now, for Beumer, Netflix is the future.

“I do not say never, never,” she addresses the question of whether she will again make another film of her own. For now, though, one of the Netherlands’ most successful filmmakers has reinvented herself as a commissioner and doesn’t want to look in the rear view mirror.

Visit Antoinette Beumer's website here. For more information on the Netherlands Film Festival and Holland Film Meeting, click here.
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*Film supported by the Netherlands Film Fund
**Film supported by the Netherlands Film Fund and the Netherlands Film Production Incentive