BLACK BOOK (ZWARTBOEK)
Director: Paul Verhoeven Stars: Carice van Houten, Sebastian Koch, Thom Hoffmann, Derek De Lint, Christian Berkel
Reviewed by PETER MALONE
Director Paul Verhoeven made his name in his native Holland with such films as Turkish Delight, Spetters, The Fourth Man. He then went to the United States in the 1980s and made a number of significant films – in a rather in-your-face Dutch style: Robocop, Total Recall, Basic Instinct, Showgirls, Starship Troopers. He has now returned to his country to make this memoir of Dutch participation in World War Two.
While the film is very reminiscent of the big-budget war memoir and action films of the 1960s (Operation Crossbow, The Dirty Dozen), it is reminiscent also of the tribute films made in the 1950s. MGM’s Betrayed (1954) with Clark Gable, Lana Turner and Victor Mature is very similar in its plot outline.
The film begins and ends on an Israeli kibbutz in 1956, also giving some insight into the consequences of World War Two and Hitler’s treatment of the Jews. The kibbutz has been set up with moneys confiscated by the Nazis from Jews. However, the film goes back in time to focus on a young woman who is being hidden by a Catholic family when their house is destroyed and she discovers that her parents are on a boat to be taken to freedom. She joins them – but Dutch traitors have sold out and the Jews are murdered and their goods confiscated. She joins the Dutch Resistance.
The film is also a portrait of the Dutch Resistance, the relentless leaders, the raids, the dangers experienced. The young woman, using her wits very quickly on a train, is able then to infiltrate Gestapo headquarters, have a relationship with the chief. This leads her to be able to plant a microphone in the office. However, there is a traitor amongst the Resistance and the plans go awry. With some detective work, especially after the end of the war, the traitors are revealed. There are some very powerful sequences at the end where the young woman, branded as a traitor herself, is humiliated by angry Dutch citizens and officials after the war.
The film does not paint a black and white picture of Dutch participation in the war – some people are heroic, others are traitors and greedy for their own gain, not scrupulous in betraying their fellow Dutch and, especially, Jewish citizens.
While Paul Verhoeven evokes memories of past films, his own franker style of film-making means that some of the sexual implications of the stories as well as scenes of violence are much more explicit in this film.
Carice van Houten shows great versatility in the central role. Sebastian Koch is a more sympathetic Gestapo leader. Thom Hoffmann (who had appeared in Verhoeven’s The Fourth Man) is a resistance leader.
The film always keeps the interest, is an example of the work of somebody who is able to help a nation examine its conscience and look again at the history of the past without romanticising it – or, while romanticising it, look at some of the realities and the darker side as well.
Reviewed by WENDY RAWADY
Ahhhh, it’s been a long time since I saw a film that deserves 100% score in the ‘rattling good yarn’ genre. Black Book would have Sam Fuller salivating at its impeccable story components and he would, no doubt, be jealous of the passionate cast, production design and music that lift this film from the realms of ‘Ho hum, another Nazi versus the Allies and Underground’ collection of linked set-pieces into something as gripping and passionate as this one. And what’s more, it is Dutch! How unexpected! Yes, I DID say ‘passion! The cast is magical, pairing real life couple Carice van Houten and Sebastian Koch as the troubled lovers, one a Dutch patriot working for the underground and the other a Nazi officer.
The director is Paul Verhoeven, and once you see this film you will forgive him for the icky lasciviousness of Showgirls (1995). He clearly has put the autobiographical sensitivity of wartime Holland to good use. Also up there on the screen is every dollar of what is Holland’s largest filmmaking budget. There is a sense of realism and suspense that will keep you on the edge of your seat from the first frame till the end of the closing credits. The totally absorbing story for the film was written by Paul Verhoeven and screenwriter Gerard Soeteman, his partner in films such as Turkish Delight (1973) and Soldier Of Orange (1977). Both had been working on the script for fifteen years but in the early 2000s, their decision to change the main character from male to female made the film what it is today. The story will keep you emotionally and mentally alert and the screenplay supports it perfectly with visuals that are guaranteed to give you much to think about.
Carice van Houten is a beautiful, stunning actress and performer with more than her fair share of charisma. Classy from the start in the role of Rachel Stein, daughter of a wealthy Jewish diamond merchant, she sparkles as the personification of the polar opposite to Anne Frank. She isn’t going to hide in a garret and write a diary but chooses to face, and sometime cause, trauma and unbelievable risk, Rachel puts herself directly at the centre of conflict not just for revenge but in order to save many more than herself. Where she ends up at the very end of the film speaks volumes about her motives. The film is book-ended by a sequence in an Israeli Kibbutz many years after the war and the poignancy of the closing scene made me want to scream out at the ridiculousness of all ongoing nationalistic or religion-based conflict. I am betting that van Houten will be all over our screens soon in Hollywood films but also as the face of one or other of the cosmetics companies - she is definitely ‘worth it’.
It is important not to read too much about this until after seeing the film and you will be rewarded by the beautifully measured suspense of each turning point.