Natalie Gerhardstein: How has your film, “Gutland”, been received so far?

Govinda Van Maele: Prior to the premiere here in Luxembourg I had been warned that Luxembourgers would hate the film, but that hasn't been my experience at all! 

There were certainly those who had their objections, but it was never our intention to make a film that pleases everybody anyway, so that's fine. By and large the local audience has received it quite well actually.

International audiences are responding quite well too. Just [the week of 24 January], in a festival of German cinema in Lisbon, we came in third in the audience poll--that's pretty decent for a film that's not even German!

NG: Can you tell us about plans for your next project?

GVM: I'm currently developing several stories, but haven't decided yet which one to pursue as my next project, so I can't say much more. What they have in common though is this Luxembourgish environment we live in, it's quite particular and distinct from other countries, but we only rarely see it treated in fiction. 

People outside of the country have no perception of what this place is, not the superficial image that you might find in a travel catalog, but what this place really is deeper down. So for a filmmaker there's still a lot of unchartered territory to find here.

NG: What are you looking forward to in terms of being on the Luxembourg City Film Festival 2019 jury?

I'll finally have a good excuse to go see every film in the competition!

For more information about “Gutland”, visit the film’s website. The DVD is also available for purchase via Tarantula.