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‘Three Days of Fish’ Review: A Warm Breeze of Melancholy Runs Through This Dutch Father-Son Portrait
A Dutch expat retiree revisits his homeland — and the son he left behind — in Peter Hoogendoorn's poignant sophomore feature 'Three Days of Fish.'
It takes a little time to work out exactly what family politics connect (or separate) taciturn retired mechanic Gerrie (Ton Kas), his shambling middle-aged son Dick (Guido Pollemans), and a second child, Nadia (Neidi Dos Santos Livramento), who doesn’t seem to have much to do with the first. Raised mostly by his grandmother after his mom died when he was a boy, Dick has grown into a diffident, eccentric outsider, with more chip than shoulder, but tender enough to have attracted a loyal, patient girlfriend in Bianca (Line Pillet, in a small but crucially endearing turn). The choice to shoot in muted, relatively low-contrast black and white — though not carelessly so, with DP Gregg Telussa elegantly layering grays to ambient, clouded-over effect — appears to reflect Gerrie’s own view of a country he has few regrets about leaving behind, and not just because of the muzzy Rotterdam weather.
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