DEMO

The film is a socially-absurd portrait of Bee, an artist in search of work. Bee lives under a bridge in the Brussels Canal Zone and is dressed up as a mascot. His main activity is boredom. It is an existential boredom, he just doesn't know what to do. Yet he remains optimistic and seizes every opportunity to entertain, to play a game, to do a trick. He films himself with a smartphone, perhaps one day in pursuit of an audience, but now mostly just because he can, as if it were a game in itself. 

Bee's movement language is reminiscent of silent movies, slapstick, musicals and cartoons, as well as that of the countless YouTube and other social media vloggers. Bee lives simultaneously in a harsh reality and - perhaps precisely because of this - in his own imagination and madness. The enthusiasm with which he tries to entertain ever more boldly becomes more frantic and dangerous, to the point of being suicidal. Suicide is unfortunately not an option, cartoon characters do not die, they get up again and again.

In DEMO we follow Bee as he wanders through the Brussels canal zone, his life as a homeless person, his boredom, his stunts. In addition, DEMO is also a historical document of a city in change. The gentrification and development of the Brussels canal zone means that messy playgrounds, empty buildings, shelters for the homeless and refugees have given way to glitzy skate parks and clean-cut public spaces, to a new contemporary art museum, to a renovated theater and posh apartments. DEMO may well be one of the last films to bear witness to “the old” canal zone. Bee is part of the environment in which he lives. He is part of the décor, it defines him and at the same time he dissolves in it. With the transformation of this area, Bee's habitat also disappears. Where should figures like him go? What place do they still have in our society?