Black Book (Zwartboek) Review

"Black Book (Zwartboek)" reviews

Movie

Black Book (Zwartboek)

Author

anonymous

Date reviewed

2007-09-25 21:32:14

Rating

2/5

Provider

CinemaSource

Review

Director Paul Verhoeven's well-acted but overblown (and overly long) WWII thriller Black Book is like The Diary of Anne Frank by way of Basic Instinct.

Story

Structured as one big flashback, Black Book tells the story of Rachel Stein (Carice van Houten), a Dutch Jew in hiding during World War II. When her cover is blown, she reunites with her family to try to sneak out of the country--only to be ambushed by the Germans. The sole survivor of the attack, one-time cabaret singer Rachel joins the resistance movement, dyes her dark hair blonde, and becomes Ellis de Vries. A chance meeting with nice-guy German officer Capt. Ludwig Müntze (Sebastian Koch) leads to both a secretarial job at Nazi headquarters (a handy place for a spy) and romance. But after Ellis discovers the truth behind the assault that killed her family, things start spinning out of control, with multiple betrayals and double-crosses threatening to destroy what little she has left.

Acting

The majority of Black Book rests squarely on van Houten's slender shoulders--so it's a good thing she's up to the task. As lovely as any real 1940s screen siren, she's also believably tough and resilient, which is a good thing, given everything Rachel/Ellis has to go through. Classier than the heroines of previous Verhoeven movies like Showgirls and Basic Instinct, Ellis still shares a scrappy determination and sensuous femininity with her cinematic sisters, and van Houten throws herself into the part without reservation (and, in some scenes, without clothes). Koch is both idealistic and pragmatic as Capt. Müntze--which makes him a noble counterpart to the odious Lieut. Günther Franken (Waldemar Kobus), whom Ellis is determined to take down. She finds an ally in fellow secretary Ronnie (a scene-stealing, Christine Baranski-esque Halina Reijn), whose depths prove unexpected.

Direction

Verhoeven is hardly known as a master of subtlety, and Black Book is no exception. Why have one double-cross when you can squeeze in three or four? Why stop at a topless scene when you can show your heroine dying the carpet to match the curtains? Why use subtle scoring to enhance a scene's mood when heavy-handed musical cues can pound a moment home? But even with this tendency toward excess aside, the movie has problems. The 145-minute running time throws off the pacing; in the final third, there's a disconcerting sense of multiple endings. And, ultimately, there's a certain lack of suspense--since the film is set up as a flashback, audiences know that Rachel/Ellis is going to survive no matter what's thrown at her. Black Book may be better than many of the other movies on the director's resume, but it's still a Verhoeven flick through and through.

Bottom Line

Hollywood.com rated this film 2 stars.

Movie

Black Book

Author

anonymous

Date reviewed

2007-01-12 16:50:05

Provider

Review

After Robocop and Total Recall, Paul Verhoeven looked like the director of the future, a man with his finger on a new cyber-pulse. Then Basic Instinct and Showgirls portrayed him as a dirty-mac hack, and, after the overrated sci-fi Starship Troopers, he scuttled off back to his native Holland. Now he has shocked everyone all over again, with an old-fashioned WWII action rollercoaster, shot through with political and sexual overtones.

It stars Carice Van Houten as a Jewish singer, Rachel, whose bid to escape Nazi-occupied northern Netherlands fails in tragedy when the boat in which she and others are travelling is ambushed. All on board are killed, except for Rachel who dives into the river. Immediately joining the Dutch resistance (pointedly called terrorists by the Nazis), she falls under the wing of the highly disciplined socialist Kuipers (Derek de Lint). When three members, including Kuipers' son, are captured by the Nazis, Rachel - now re-named Ellis - is ordered to infiltrate the Nazi command. "You want me to screw him?" she clarifies. But of course.

Black Book then veers off into familiar Verhoeven territory - sex as power. Rachel/Ellis grows deeper into her role as the Nazi's lover, bugging his office, dying her pubic hair to match her new blonde Aryan hair-do. She feels guilt for her duplicity, even though her work, helping to root out a Nazi spy in the resistance, is essential.

Van Houten is magnificent as Rachel, convincing both in her role as singer and as the beautiful, voluptuous lover. We're introduced to her initially in '50s Israel, now living with "survivor guilt". She has done more than her share in the battle, but the difficulty for her comes in reconciling where duty ends and the personal begins. In Black Book, Verhoeven has made a modern old-fashioned masterpiece and perhaps even washed away a few sins of his own.