Bob Entrop

A documentary about the Sinti en Roma in The Netherlands.

A Roma without music is not really a Roma. In this personal quest to find the last Sinti and Roma, filmmaker Bob Entrop follows three gypsy bands. He travels with the Basily's to Prague, where they receive a warm welcome as a Dutch jazz band. Young Paulus Schäfer and his Gipsyband reach a high point when they perform together with the world-famous Rosenberg Trio. And with Roger, a Swiss musician/composer who has settled in the Netherlands, he visits his in-laws in Germany, where he sings a moving duet with his father-in-law, who has dementia. For all three, Django Reinhardt is the unsurpassed maestro.

Award-winning film that tells the story of twelve Romany travelers who survived the genocide on gypsies during World War 2 - a piece of history largely undocumented until now.

Director Bob Entrop has been fascinated for years with the life of Roma and Sinti gypsies, their peculiar practices, codes and taboos. He tries to gain a better understanding of this vexed community - traditionally associated with campfires, abundant eating and drinking and music. He poses some imaginative questions in his film. More than once, however, he is told that something is none of his business or that 'those matters' are not discussed, especially not in front of a camera. Still, he manages to lift a corner of the veil.

Many subjects are taboo within the gypsy or rather Roma and Sinti communities. This partly explains why relatively little attention is paid to the scores of Roma and Sinti (the film mentions almost a million) who died in World War II concentration camps. Now that ever fewer eye witnesses are still alive, the remaining ones sparsely reveal a little more. Initially, Auschwitz survivor Lily only wants to explain how degrading it felt to have to undress in front of German officers - nudity and sexuality are big taboos. Still, a little later she decides to tell how women were raped and abused in horrifying medical experiments.

13 years ago, director Bob Entrop made the film A piece of blue in the sky, the first film in the Netherlands that depicted the murder of almost 1 million Sinti and Roma during the Second World War. There is a taboo on what happened during the war, you don't talk about it with anyone and certainly not in front of a camera. Requiem for Auschwitz is a sequel, with the most valuable moments from the first film, supplemented with the grandchildren and the creation and performance of the 'Requiem for Auschwitz' by Sinti composer Roger Moreno Rathgeb by the Sinti and Roma Philharmonic from Frankfurt and a Jewish choir in the Berliner Dom in Berlin, during Holocaust Memorial Day. During his visit to Auschwitz in 2020 with four musicians from the Dutch Accompaniment Orchestra, Roger shows them the places that inspired him.

13 years ago, director Bob Entrop made the film A piece of blue in the sky, the first film in the Netherlands that depicted the murder of almost 1 million Sinti and Roma during the Second World War. There is a taboo on what happened during the war, you don't talk about it with anyone and certainly not in front of a camera. Requiem for Auschwitz is a sequel, with the most valuable moments from the first film, supplemented with the grandchildren and the creation and performance of the 'Requiem for Auschwitz' by Sinti composer Roger Moreno Rathgeb by the Sinti and Roma Philharmonic from Frankfurt and a Jewish choir in the Berliner Dom in Berlin, during Holocaust Memorial Day. During his visit to Auschwitz in 2020 with four musicians from the Dutch Accompaniment Orchestra, Roger shows them the places that inspired him.

13 years ago, director Bob Entrop made the film A piece of blue in the sky, the first film in the Netherlands that depicted the murder of almost 1 million Sinti and Roma during the Second World War. There is a taboo on what happened during the war, you don't talk about it with anyone and certainly not in front of a camera. Requiem for Auschwitz is a sequel, with the most valuable moments from the first film, supplemented with the grandchildren and the creation and performance of the 'Requiem for Auschwitz' by Sinti composer Roger Moreno Rathgeb by the Sinti and Roma Philharmonic from Frankfurt and a Jewish choir in the Berliner Dom in Berlin, during Holocaust Memorial Day. During his visit to Auschwitz in 2020 with four musicians from the Dutch Accompaniment Orchestra, Roger shows them the places that inspired him.

Three women with Roma backgrounds each seek their own path to freedom and independence. Ruva was born deaf and fled Kosovo at a young age to escape the culture. Nadita was adopted as a baby and never knew her Serbian biological parents. Cillia lives according to the strict rules of traditional Sinti culture, which sometimes clash with her career as a dancer.

Director Entrop follows Lalla Weiss for a year, the spokeswoman of the national Sinti and Roma organisation. Weiss emphasises that the Roma and Sinti have been denied a place in our culture for seven hundred years, and that this is only recently and gradually changing. She herself is the living proof of the fact that things can change: she is married to Kees, a civilian, and as his wife she takes the lead in the traditional male dominated Roma and Sinti societies.

Director Entrop follows Lalla Weiss for a year, the spokeswoman of the national Sinti and Roma organisation. Weiss emphasises that the Roma and Sinti have been denied a place in our culture for seven hundred years, and that this is only recently and gradually changing. She herself is the living proof of the fact that things can change: she is married to Kees, a civilian, and as his wife she takes the lead in the traditional male dominated Roma and Sinti societies.

Director Entrop follows Lalla Weiss for a year, the spokeswoman of the national Sinti and Roma organisation. Weiss emphasises that the Roma and Sinti have been denied a place in our culture for seven hundred years, and that this is only recently and gradually changing. She herself is the living proof of the fact that things can change: she is married to Kees, a civilian, and as his wife she takes the lead in the traditional male dominated Roma and Sinti societies.

Director Entrop follows Lalla Weiss for a year, the spokeswoman of the national Sinti and Roma organisation. Weiss emphasises that the Roma and Sinti have been denied a place in our culture for seven hundred years, and that this is only recently and gradually changing. She herself is the living proof of the fact that things can change: she is married to Kees, a civilian, and as his wife she takes the lead in the traditional male dominated Roma and Sinti societies.