Plan Delta

According to director Bob Visser, Plan Delta (from 1983) is a 'time fiction', a film that examines rising sea levels in the future. Around the year 2300, a highly developed and a more primitive culture meet after catastrophic flooding. The former have lost their fertility, the latter have remained virile. Then a primitive woman is kidnapped by the other group to safeguard their future. Shot in the 1980s amid 66 pillars the size of cathedrals in an imposing setting that seems simultaneously mythical and futuristic in the landscape of Zeeland, which is sometimes referred to as the 'artwork of the century'. Visser's timing was perfect: while the storm surge barrier was under construction, it looked like a formation of space ships or a temple from a long-forgotten past. Soon afterward, the building site was inundated and the gigantic pillars disappeared beneath the waves forever. What remains is an eight-kilometre-long dam, the Oosterscheldedam. (International Film Festival Rotterdam)