• Director: Robin Pront
• With: Jonas Vermeulen, Charlotte Timmers, Matteo Simoni, Barabra Sarafian, Geert Van Rampelberg, Luc Wyns, Ward Kerremans, Ella Leyers, Milorad Kapor, Jennifer Heylen, Dirk Roothooft
• Music by: Zillion
• Duration: 2h18
• Rating: 8/10

Synopsis:

Zillion tells the epic story of the rise and fall of the country’s biggest disco ever. In an age when ‘the sky was the limit’, in a universe where sex & drugs, techno and most of all loads of money circulate freely, the protagonists go is search of fame and kicks, alongside respect and love. The stuff money can’t buy.

Review:

In the nineties the clubscene in Belgium was famous all over Europe, and beyond! (Still is, only now it’s more the festivals like Tomorrowland that reigns the music scene!) and this movie is the story about one of the most talked about, visited and also most controversial dance palace of that time, the Zillion in Antwerp!

Frank Verstraeten is a small crook, small because of the scope of his criminal actions but also of his posture. But he thinks great and big thoughts. He looks up at the world and all he wants is for the world to look up at him, instead of down!

With the help of a porn king, Dennis Black Magic, and his mother and hated by the government and tax collectors, he decides to open up a new club, because he’s thrown out of the Carré, the biggest club at that time, after he makes a fool of himself and destroys a part of the entrance.

And hens very motivated to do this because in Carré he met the woman of his dreams, Vanessa Goossens, miss Belgium! And he would do everything for her!

But like all megalomaniac ideas, there’s a fast rise but an even faster fall and the fall is harder and deeper than the rise could ever be!

Although some of this movie is fiction, the general story about Frank and Vanessa (in real life she was Brigitta Callens but she didn’t want to be associated to this movie) is actually true. Like all the drugs, violence and sex (Zundays at Zillion were famous! I had an ex-boyfriend who visited them, I declined to go then) which was the reason for the downfall, and of course tax evasion!

But the movie is also a huge nostalgic trip to the nineties and it proves to me that Belgian cinema has evolved very much! This is a movie with so much talent in acting but Robin Pront has shown the possibilities in Belgian filmmaking… it makes me proud to say I live in the country this was made!

The music in this film is just great (especially for someone like me who’s stuck in the nineties and its music!)

Oh and casting: spot on! Matteo Simoni as Dennis Black Magic 👌👌 and Jonas Vermeulen as Verstraeten… it’s as if Frank is suddenly back!

I definitely loved this one! One of my favourite Belgian movies ever made!!