GHOST TROPIC

59-year-old Khadija returns home on the last subway after a long day of work as a cleaning lady. Fatigue takes its toll and Khadija falls asleep, missing her usual stop. Now she has to get home on her own. A nocturnal journey that gradually shows her a different side of Brussels.

Ghost Tropic is Bas Devos' third film. The film followed barely a year after the oppressive urban portrait Hellhole, in which Devos portrayed the aftermath of the traumatic 22 March 2016 attacks in Brussels. Why did Ghost Tropic come about so quickly? "Some people had a false and negative image of Brussels after watching Hellhole. I realized that I had not answered the questions I raised," he confessed during Cannes 2019.

In Ghost Tropic, nighttime, magically lit Brussels becomes an intimate dreamland, with beauty in even the darkest places. A warm urban symphony that shows the human side of our metropolis and in doing so warms up not only Brussels, but also the viewer.

The soundtrack by guitarist and composer Brecht Ameel is at least as beautiful as the film itself. His fragile and hushed compositions for resonator guitar resonate beautifully with the magical night portrait that is Ghost Tropic. The album Ghost Tropic was released in early 2020 on the Hands in the Dark label.

Fiction film / 2019 / duration: 1:25 / Belgium / director: Bas Devos / Cast: Saadia Bentaïeb, Nora Dari, Maaike Neuville, et al. / Dialogues: French, Dutch / Subtitles: Dutch

MAIKA GARNICA & ANS MERTENS - INTERLUDE

"Resonance is the shadow of sound," that thought went through the head of artist Maika Garnica when visiting the Residential Care Center Immaculata in Edegem. Just as a shadow is caused by light, resonance is created when making sound. After a beat on the drum or the dropping of a glass, the sound vibrates further and swells out. Garnica took filmmaker Ans Mertens under her wing and together they discovered that resonance can also have a social meaning: how do the lives of an older generation resonate in society and with a younger generation? How can we visualize the resonance of a life that will soon become a shadow and resonate as a light vibration in its surroundings? The result is a short, quiet sound video that focuses on Garnica's ceramic sound objects, their forms, shadows and sounds.

Credits

Film by Maika Garnica & Ans Mertens
Image Ans Mertens
Instruments & Music Maika Garnica
Sound Design Maika Garnica & Adriaan Severins
Sound Recording & Postproduction Adriaan Severins
Commissioned by Museum E!

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Velma Spell - Constellation Audio Walk (ongoing, start STUK gevel Naamsestraat)

"A stunning little gem."- The Hollywood Reporter