Foto: Nederlands Film Festival/Marcel Krijgsman

Ido Abram may disagree, but there are few professionals within the Dutch film industry as qualified, or as skilled, to take over as head of the Netherlands Film Festival, running 20-27 September in Utrecht.
 
Prior to NFF, he was Deputy Director of Eye Filmmuseum and boss of Dutch promotional body SEE NL. He previously ran the Binger Filmlab in Amsterdam, which served as one of the pillars on which the Dutch industry rested during the years he was in charge. And before that he was head of CineMart, the mother of all co-production markets, at IFFR in Rotterdam. And if we were to go back even further, even before he worked under Nicolaine den Breejen at the transformative arthouse distribution company Cinemien, he worked at the Netherlands Film Festival as a volunteer. He may be the “new kid on the block at NFF,” as he puts it, but he is one who has come full circle.
 
“I feel very privileged and I'm very happy that they wanted to have me here, but I have to prove that I'm worth doing the job,” he tells SEE NL. “I'm not modest because I know what I can do, but I know other people who could also have done this job also in a perfect way, but I'm very happy they took me on.”

Abram, who shares top management and board duties with NFF Business Director Marjolijn Bronkhuyzen, is a passionate supporter and defender of Dutch cinema and its practitioners (and those of other associated audiovisual media), and is an avowed admirer of Utrecht’s smart and cine-literate audiences. All of which indicates that NFF seems set once more to meets its full potential as the top outlet for Netherlands film fare; be a place where cineastes can meet the directors and actors, and provide an environment where professionals can mingle and cogitate, learn and debate, all for the betterment of the industry they serve.

“I want this festival - and it's already just about there - but moreso to really salute the Dutch filmmakers, to celebrate our films, to look through their eyes to the world and to improve the interaction with the audience,” Abram underlines.

Any necessary changes to the festival infrastructure or its conceptual approach, Abram will begin to put into place the day after doors shut on the 2024 festival.

“If we're going to change things then it will be for next year, but don't expect the world to be changed completely. I think we can tweak some things, that's what I will discuss with the team. But I also want to discuss with our partners outside because that's also what the Dutch festival is for, for all the Dutch film professionals. There are quite a large number of people with outspoken ideas who have already told me that we need to sit down and drink a coffee. Well, I will drink those coffees.”

Before that, though, he is in the mood to celebrate great cinema, as evidenced by the intensely moving and thought-provoking opening film White Flash* by Laura Hermanides (see article link), and the closing film Paradijs by Bobbie Koek in which, Abram stresses, “not one shot is wrong, every shot is perfect.” 
 
He further underlines the many qualities of Dutch cinema on display in Utrecht (and if for some reason, you don't see these films here, then you will see them at other top Dutch fests, such as IDFA, IFFR or Cinekid). “Our animation films, our children's films, our interactive films,” he lists the genres in which Dutch filmmakers excel. “We have incredible short films which are really hard to promote and to bring to an audience, so thank God we can do it at a festival like NFF. And we have fantastic documentaries and the best documentary film festival [IDFA] in the world, in our country,” he adds.
 
“In Utrecht we present films and series in all their different shapes and formats: as entertainment, as art, as culture, as points for discussion, you name it. These films I will always fight for,” Abram stresses. “The energy, here in Utrecht, it’s addictive. And maybe more like the festival which I used to know in the past.”

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*Film is supported by the Netherlands Film Fund