Waves Beneath The Water

Director: Arthur de Bruin

“We always see the water surface from above, reflecting the above water world. People have no idea of what goes on underneath, of the colors, the beauty, the play of light, the behaviour of fish and all the other life forms that are at home in this world.”

In recent years, a deep passion for freshwater ecology drove Arthur to make a film about a world he has been studying for years. It is the same wonder and curiosity that many children have for the frogs and the fishes, which Arthur has never really let go of. He has a background in aquatic ecology and worked 13 years as a fish researcher before he directed Waves Beneath the Water. In his work he noticed that it is not easy to inspire people for fish or amphibians. Life below the water level is pretty invisible to most people. Where a bird researcher uses his binoculars to study the behavior of birds, Arthur grabbed his diving mask to study the behavior of fish. This turned out to be so fascinating that he quickly bought an underwater housing for his camera, to be able to share his passion with others.
The discovery that people are interested in the Dutch underwater world came after Arthur made a series of photos during a major flooding of the rivers. He photographed fish swimming on maedows and between the trees. Those pictures made it to the front pages of almost every newspaper in the Netherlands. It meant the start of capturing and illustrating freshwater wildlife as a profession (www.blikonderwater.nl), now 10 years ago.
From the beginning, his focus lays on following and observing the animals to record their natural behavior. Those film images were quickly discoverend and used in several movies and TV programs.

In 2017, the idea to make a film about the underwater nature started to raise in Arthurs mind and now, five years and over 500 days under water later Waves Beneath the Water is presented. He worked day and night on it and his knowledge of 10 years of underwater photography, his technical experience with filming underwater, his previous expeditions to all corners of the Netherlands and his work as a fish researcher were a solid base to make this movie.