Monikondee

Synopsis

Flowing along the border between Suriname and French Guiana, the Maroni River is home to Indigenous peoples and the Maroons, descendants of Africans who escaped Dutch enslavers.

Boogie lives by this river. By canoe, he hauls everyday goods to village communities while also delivering fuel to gold miners who pollute the water and wreck local livelihoods. When elders call him in for a meeting regarding his nephew, Boogie sets off on a voyage that pulls him into reflection on old and new ways of life.

Across a landscape steadily eroded by climate change and gold mining, Monikondee uses stories and songs to reveal the pressures these communities endure and their fierce determination to protect their ancestral lands.

Director Biography

Tolin Alexander, Lonnie van Brummelen, Siebren de Haan

Lonnie van Brummelen & Siebren de Haan

Collaborating artists and filmmakers. Their works explore geopolitical landscapes, such as international borders and sites of global trade, as well as the material impacts of resource extraction on local communities and ecosystems. They have created three feature-length participatory documentaries. Their films have screened at film festivals worldwide including IDFA, TIFF, CPH:DOX, Mar del Plata, MoMA’s Documentary Fortnight, ICA’s Frames of Representation.

Tolin Alexander

Surinamese writer, theater maker, and performer specializing in cross-cultural theatre and community projects. His work is influenced by Augusto Boal’s Theatre of the Oppressed. In collaboration with Dutch artist-filmmakers Lonnie van Brummelen and Siebren de Haan, he directed two participatory documentaries. His recent plays were performed on a boat in Paramaribo harbor in collaboration with the theatre group Ship of Fools. In 2025, he will curate the exhibition Het Bos van Suriname in the museum and biodiversity research center Naturalis in Leiden.

Credits

Cinematography / Sinematografi

Sander Coumou, Siebren de Haan

Animation / Animasyon

Barend Onneweer

Editing / Kurgu

Bobbie Roelofs, Lonnie van Brummelen

Sound / Ses

Idi Lemmers, Jaim Sahuleka

Narrator / Anlatıcı

Boogie Adijontoe

Production / Yapım

Lonnie van Brummelen (VRIZA), Ann Hermelijn