Author/s Edwin Trommelen, Paul Enkelaar

Filmographies
EDWIN TROMMELEN 11-7-1963

Documentary’s
Director (together with Paul Enkelaar) – Back to the Camp; Stg. XTV, NCRV, uitz. 2001, VRT uitz. 2003
– The Last Outcry; Idtv, NCRV, uitz. 2003
– Caught in Mordovia; Stg. XTV, Oost-Europa Kanaal, uitz. 2004

Director – Behind the Black Mountains. The Remarkable Life of Count Anton Devier, MM-filmproducties, Joodse Omroep, uitz. 2006 – Turkmenistan, Land of my Father. Goed.tv, uitz. 2009
As Line Producer – Black Eyes, Jan Bosdriesz, SNG-film en NPS (Holland Dok), uitz. 2009 – Chair Nr. 13 – ILF & PETROV, Tom d’Angremond, Interakt, in preparation

As researcher and/or line-producer – Hollywood at the Neva, Frank Wiering, VPRO, 1991 – The Portrait of Natasha, Jimini Hignett & Hens van Rooy, SNG en NOS, 1992 – Our Man in Kazakhstan, Marjoleine Boonstra, TV DITS en KRO, 1993 – Sotsgorod: Cities for Utopia, Anna Abrahams, SNG en NOS, 1995 – Bela, Bela – What Keeps Mankind Alive, Marjoleine Boonstra, Pieter van Huystee Film en HO, 2001 – Repin, Painter of the Russian Soul, John Appel, Idtv en AVRO, 2002 – Haven, Roaming through the Night, Marjoleine Boonstra, Pieter van Huystee Film en HO, 2004 – Meeting Strangers, Prosper de Roos, Zeppers Film & tv en NPS (Holland Dok), uitz. 2009

Short films
Director – Turkmenistan – My Homeland, Avantis Promo & Alegria, Arte France and Arte Germany, 2012

Publications – Davay! The Russians and their vodka. Mets & Mets, Amsterdam, 2010.
American edition: Russian Life Books, Montpelier, Vermont, 2012.

PAUL ENKELAAR 13-04-1964
Documentary’s (Director and Cameraman)
* Wheat for Fish (VPRO),
* Africa In the Picture (IKON),
* Holy Land Caravan (HOS),
* The Last Miners (NCRV)
* The Grand Crossing
* Strengthening Community Radio in West-Africa (RNTC)
* Mother Earth (Llink)

Logline
The film is about the Tundra Yukagirs in Yakutia (Siberia) and a dedicated researcher who
assists them in recording their language and describing their way of life.

Subject
In northeastern Siberia, above the Arctic Circle, live the Tundra Yukagirs, nomadic reindeer herders. Sixty-three of them still speak Yukagir, a uniquely musical language that turns melodic as storytellers relate traditional tales of Yukagir history. Only two elderly masters of this skill remain. Amsterdam linguist Cecilia Odé has made repeated trips to the remote corner of eastern Siberia that the Yukagirs call home to capture their language and preserve it for posterity. A diagnosis of metastatic cancer threatened to end these trips, but a period of remission enabled her to return to the land of the Yukagirs once again, perhaps for the last time. Cecilia speaks openly about her lethal disease, which gives the film an impressive extra layer.

Synopsis
Cecilia’s journey features all the ingredients of a fascinating and inspiring documentary: a dedicated scholar whose life work is to preserve a vanishing language; a people torn between, on the one hand, age-old traditions and the challenges of subsistence in the brutal cold of Siberia and, on the other, the seductions of an easier life in the region’s towns and cities; the primeval power of the songs retained by aged Yukagirs raised by parents who could recall pre-Soviet times and hopeful scenes of schoolchildren learning their ancestral language using materials developed with Cecelia’s help; the romance of lassos, reindeer herds, and deerskin tents pitched on the ice.
But the film’s strongest asset is the heart-warming friendship that has developed between Cecilia and the Yukagirs. This friendship allows the filmmakers to enter the Yukagir community in an unforced manner and gain access to the people’s innermost thoughts. The trust and confidence developed through Cecelia’s longstanding relationships with members of the Yukagir community enable the filmmakers to produce a compellingly genuine portrait of extraordinary people living their lives in distant Siberia and capture frank discussions about their disappearing language, their traditional way of life, and their efforts to keep their culture alive.

Research Cecilia Odé
Photography Paul Enkelaar
Sound Paul Enkelaar
Editing Albert Elings