(De verworking van Herman Dürer). This groundbreaking film was the first Dutch feature to be shown at alternative art houses in the Netherlands, the first to be wholly financed by the government, and the result of an unusual three-way directorial and scriptwriting collaboration. Recognized as one of the best of the recent Dutch films, The Demise of Herman Dürer is probably the freshest approach to a potentially tired subject-disaffected youth-to emerge from any country in years. Seventeen-year-old Herman Dürer, in order to escape the boredom of a nine-week prison sentence, picks up the eighteenth-century novel, "From the Life of a Good-for-Nothing," a vision of a young man who pursues his own private dream world, by German writer Joseph von Eichendorff. On his return home, Herman again turns to the world of the Romantic novel, this time to escape the monotony of job and home, and, on impulse, takes off in pursuit of the Romantic dream. Heading for Italy, Herman gets only as far as Munich before an Italian immigrant describes for him the reality of industrialized Italy. Indeed, all around him, the stark reality of industrialized Europe contrasts with the idyll of his imaginings, and Herman's alienation builds to a desperate climax.
"The three young directors of this film, who met each other while studying at the Netherlands Film Academy, have clearly been influenced by the work of Wim Wenders and the novelist Peter Handke.... Nevertheless, their control of the pace and feeling of the movie is idiosyncratic enough to stand on its own. Herman becomes more than just another layabout; the potential for good and for imaginative achievement that lies within him is perceptible more and more sharply as the film proceeds, and the excursions into a costumed eighteenth century are both valid and touching...." --Peter Cowie, "International Film Guide"