Info

Waar de Ratten Koning Zijn (1985)

Name: Waar de Ratten Koning Zijn
Genre: Documentary
Released: 2026-04-18T17:06:17+02:00
Rating: 3.5

Documentary | 56 minutes

3,50 5 votes

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1 comment

Genre: Documentary

Duration: 56 minuten

Country: Netherlands

Directed by: Barbara den Uyl

This movie is not available on US streaming services.

Waar de Ratten Koning Zijn plot

The Amsterdam Staatsliedenbuurt was once a kind of free state for squatters, punks and original residents who had united in the Woongroep Staatsliedenbuurt. The authority of the municipality had been reduced to virtually zero after years of failing housing policy. The neighborhood had meanwhile taken matters into its own hands, which became painfully clear when Mayor Van Thijn was violently evicted from the neighborhood at the end of 1984. Filmmaker and local resident Barbara den Uyl filmed for more than a year how the residents fight their battle with the system.

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T.O.

2445 messages
2826 votes

18 April at 17:06

I have lived in the Staatsliedenbuurt myself for well over ten years and can certainly conclude that the squatter past has been slowly but surely erased. I still occasionally read the local Staatskrant, which I believe has always been closely connected to the squatter movement, and it was no coincidence that a piece about this documentary appeared in it.

I immediately looked it up on YouTube. As expected, the neighborhood is almost unrecognizable from the footage. Fascinating to see such a parallel society from about forty years ago.