The story

In the vulnerable period when teenagers break away from home and friendship becomes their main support, Samuel (17) loses his best friend Fin (18). Not knowing how to deal with this in an environment where life goes on as usual for the rest of the world, he flees to the place where he feels most connected to his best friend. At their familiar hangout at the lake in the woods, Sam seeks to confront his loss. Here he not only finds Fin again, but also the part of himself he had lost in his grief.

“If only I had..."

Regret and guilt are often strongly present after the sudden loss of a loved one. Due to the struck fate, many things have gone unspoken, because we assumed we would have more time together. We feel a strong urge to still express these feelings, whether it be directed to a headstone, a photo, the sky, in your head or something that reminds you of the person. It needs to get out. Everyone creates their own place for memorial. In the film Fin, we see the visualization of such a memorial place.

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Grief

That Dutch/Western culture struggles with grief is no secret. Despite growing awareness, there seems to be very little movement. From our own experiences with grief we know how complicated it can be to deal with it in the "right" way, both for the person grieving and his/her environment.

We live in a hasty, fleeting world in which we take very little time for genuine appreciation: both for moments and for each other. We are always on the go and there is always something that demands our attention. In the film Fin we come to a stop, take our time and in silence experience what really matters.

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Friendship and adolescence

A universal aspect of adolescence is that children begin to rebel against their parents and start to shape their own lives. Fleeing the dependence of home, life at this age often takes place outside the walls of the family home. Not with their family by blood, but with their family by choice.

In these crucial friendships - in which it seems they are the only ones who truly understand us, we experience joy, sadness, love, despair, freedom and uncertainty. We experience all of our first times together and through the security our close friendships provide, we are able to discover what the world is really like. We learn from each other and dream about the future together - we can't wait to be older. Fin is an ode to a time driven by transformation and the friendships that played an indispensable role in this.

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'Fin' was created as part of 'De Ontmoeting' and was premiered at The Nederlands Film Festival 2023.