Now Do You Get It Why I'm Crying?

Now Do You Get It Why I'm Crying? (Begrijpt U Nu Waarom Ik Huil?) is a 1969 documentary film by Dutch director Louis van Gasteren. The film focuses mainly on the personality of Joop, a traumatised survivor of concentration camps.

Now Do You Get It Why I'm Crying?
Directed byLouis van Gasteren
Written byLouis van Gasteren
Produced byLouis van Gasteren
Joke Meerman
CinematographyJan de Bont
Peter Bos
Jos van Schoor
Edited byRolf Orthel
Jan Bostriesz
Huib Duyster
Bato Bachman
Production
company
Spectrum Film
Release date
  • 1969 (1969)
Running time
62 min.
CountryNetherlands
LanguagesDutch, German

Background and content

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In the late 1960s, Van Gasteren was drawn to the work of the Leiden University professor Jan Bastiaans treating traumatized war survivors. Gasteren was concerned about the psychotherapeutic treatment with LSD on a former concentration camp prisoner in Bastiaans' clinic. The patient focused on was named Joop. Joop was arrested by the Nazis in September 1941 and underwent a long journey through hell among different camps until he was liberated by the Russians in 1945. Joop returned home to his wife a different man. He had nightmares, and was incapable of ordinary human contact. With two cameras, Gasteren shot about six and a half hours of the first treatment Joop underwent at Bastiaans. Particular attention is paid to details: Joop's hands, the sweat on his forehead, a tear running down his cheek slowly. From this, Gasteren edited more than one hour of film that made a big impression at release and even led to questions in Parliament.[1] 16 mm, b/w, 62 minutes.

Sequel

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In 2003 Van Gasteren directed a sequel, The Price of Survival, about Joop's surviving family and their own continued suffering after his death in 2000.[2] 62 min, 35mm.

References

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  1. ^ "Ximon". Archived from the original on 2014-12-27. Retrieved 2013-08-14.
  2. ^ JOURNAL OF THE INTERDISCIPLINARY CROSSROADS, Vol. 3 (No. 1) April 2006, p. 189
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