Film stills by Harrie Verstappen

vista
in magic land

Movie Stills I'm guilty of

Mainly features are listed here.
Thumbnails link through to sets of stills and more complete info on the movies.

Much later, I was amazed to discover that the sheer volume of all these had made me one of 10 most published Dutch photographers—while it lasted; anonymous of course. ("Photo $corpioFilms"). As the making of stills for motion pictures is a rather unique brand of photography, I have tried to describe the pitiful process in pitiless detail:
Making Movie Stills
Moving Stories

"Pim & Wim" in

click the button!

in memoriam
Wim Verstappen

producer Frans Rasker
as the "Droste nurse"

	*Drop Out* 1969—Directed by Wim Verstappen ("yes, we have the same mother"). A bunch of protesting high school kids travel around in a VW bus with one of them special paint jobs and have their adventures.
	*Blue Movie* 1970—Directed by Wim Verstappen. The movie that put the final nail in the coffin of Dutch movie censorship. Great hit, too; made a millionaire out of my brother overnight. Shot by Jan de Bont on 16mm Ektachrome Commercial, 25ASA - I've never had so much light again. For once, it was only the quality that bugged me. The film absolutely looked like second grade duped 8mm porno. Matter of fact, the story they told around the clubs to save Jan's name was that such was the idea. Well, it was NOT.
	VD 1971—Directed by Wim Verstappen. About a Godfather type high society family and their rather involved relationships. Come right down to it, they're maniacs about sex, but just as crazy about money.
	*Frank & Eva/Living Apart Together* 1973—Directed by Pim de la Parra, Wims partner. Very trendy stuff—coined the expression "LAT". There was this scene set by candlelight. Who can describe my surprise when I walked onto the set and saw the virtually pitch dark of a missed lighting chance. Ah well. Pim is the guy who gave me the vista moniker. Vista sounds just like fietstas, Dutch for a bag strapped onto a bicycle.
	*Dakota* 1974—Directed by Wim Verstappen. I think his best, but that may be only because I worked on the script. Wim certainly did not agree! Cinematographer Jan de Bont was fired halfway through because his work was so great. I remember a cable coming in from Technicolor "Suggest absolutely N.G.". Jan's most recent epics as of date, The Haunting and Lara Croft Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life have been very expensive flops; serves him right, no offense. There were more problems, mainly with him in combination with co-star Monique van de Ven. All that took care of half the money Wim had made on Blue Movie. The rest was consumed by Pim de la Parras Wan Pipel (more or less pronounced One People. It's Takkie Takkie, which means Surinamese in Surinamese— think of "Talkie Talkie". Surinamese is now called Sranan Tongo, think of "Surinam Tongue".) By the way, Wim detested this poster. They all hated my stills anyway—until they saw the movie.
	*Alicia* 1974—Directed by Wim Verstappen About a seemingly happily married woman who runs away from home. Nice little vignette. We got in a legal fight with Coca-Cola because in the movie a chick masturbates with their Marca Registrada family-size bottle, so it was reshot with a (disposable, no-return) vin-du-pays bottle. Also on 16mm, but 100ASA Eastmancolor negative. Marc Felperlaan did camera. Not the most beautiful light you've ever seen, but hey, Marc is a nice guy, not like you-know-who.
	*My Nights With [Everybody But You]* 1975—Directed by Pim de la Parra Total flop; except in Paris, they tell me. Shows you what those Parisians know... This is the only time when I arrived for work on a set and the production turned out to be postponed for a year. Now really. As it turned out, nobody needed have bothered in the first place. About a farm with thrilly horrors, only, they are neither. The main male role was played by a guy I've never heard of again (and rightly so), except once when he was modelling underwear in an ad. The farm where we worked was known to the neighborhood as the sex farm because the owner rented it out for orgies. This guy was a Philosopher and had taken all doors out of the toilets as people should not be ashamed of their bodily functions. He himself had a working room up in the loft, where he could watch everything going on, but nobody could see him. It takes all kinds. But in all honesty, I have seen much worse horror movies—with much better actors, too.
	*Mens-Erger-Je-Niet!* 1976—Directed by Wim Verstappen About a truck driver's marriage, where the guy goes to jail for some minor offence and his wife sets out to take revenge on all the guys who helped get him in there. The title is derived from a popular Dutch board game ("Don't Get Aggravated, ~~Man~~ Person!").
	*Pastorale 1943* 1978—Directed by Wim Verstappen A super production at the time, to Dutch standards. Based on the novel by Simon Vestdijk. To me, about the relationship between the Dutch and the Germans at war. This time it was Marc's turn to fuck up badly; but not everybody would agree. It was shot on Fuji color negative, but that was not the culprit. Rather, the incurable habit of Dutch cinematographers to underexpose by one stop when shooting interiors and overexposing by one stop in exteriors. I've never been able to figure that one out. Boy, did I get into trouble with producer Frans Rasker because of my stills.
	*Grijpstra & de Gier* 1979—Directed by Wim Verstappen A roman policier by Jan-Willem van de Wetering. Should be good enough, even if I never saw it. Such a HIT that they made another one later. (It FLOPped). Boy, did I get into trouble with producer Rob Houwer. Later on, he said it was the best and largest set of stills he ever had. This was shortly before the premiere, but he paid my bill only after that. Thank heavens it was a hit! The stills were printed on Agfacolor (cheapo) and absolutely are in the worst condition of anything in my files. Available on VHS-NTSC as The Outsider, aka Outsider in Amsterdam
	*Het Verboden Bacchanaal* 1981—Directed by Wim Verstappen Another novel by Simon Vestdijk, this one on an over-sexed family, like VD. They are rather partial to holding week-end long orgies, but are the kids safely in bed? Never saw it. Not any real trouble with Frans this time.
	*Zwarte Ruiter* 1984—Directed by Wim Verstappen Boy, did I get into trouble with executive producer Gijs Versluys. But then, so did almost everybody. I used to pun him Gijs Gespuis (= ornery). An awful flop. After the première, as part of the dust settling process Gijs was fired by the producer, much to my satisfaction. Just look at that stupid hat they thought they'd print on top in the stills.
	*Pentagram* early 1980s—directed and produced by Mavis Albertina. The first Curaçao telenovela, Latin soap opera. No stills. I put it up here because it is the only production where I Created Light. Under pretty primitive conditions—you'd better believe it. Worked amazingly well. Written by musician Ced Ride.