![]() ![]() Although clearly a labor of love for Verhoeven (he spent fifteen years co-writing it with Gerard Soeteman), the screeenplay is so riddled with twists and turns and apparent inconsistencies that ultimately it can't help but collapse under its own weight. I don't mind when frank sexuality is used to elicit emotion from a viewer, but I do mind when a director makes an obvious leap into exploitation simply to get a reaction. There isn't any passion or meaning in these scenes - instead, it felt like Verhoeven was staring at me, gleefully waiting to see if I would squirm or frown. A woman pleasures herself on a piano to distract a room full of guards. An angry crowd strips away Rachel's clothing and pours a conveniently placed vat of sewage on her. A nude officer dances around a urinal to the amusement of our helpless heroine. A colleague blatantly gropes Rachel while she's preparing to infiltrate the German base. Using his plot as an excuse to put his lead actresses through a gauntlet of degrading scenes, the often depraved sexuality on display isn't offensive per se, but it feels staged and manipulative. In fact, perhaps the most striking thing about the film is the gravity of its subject matter doesn't seem to have quelled Verhoeven's penchant for taboo-breaking excess in the least. Indeed, while a synopsis of the film's plot might initially conjure up images of a smaller, Merchant-Ivory style romance epic, there's nothing small about this film, and I wouldn't call it particularly romantic, either. Given the general tone of Verhoeven's past work, I suppose it shouldn't surprise that 'Black Book' is far removed from the often staid approach of other European films with similarly themed subject matter. Although she manages to track down one of the men who massacred her fleeing refugee party, a series of events will lead both sides to determine her a traitor, resulting in repercussions and intrigue that will long outlast the war itself. After Gerben's son and several other militiamen are captured by the Nazis, Rachel is sent to save them by seducing a Nazi officer named Ludwig Müntze (Sebastian Koch), earning his trust, and then finding a way to rescue the imprisoned resistance members.Īfter successfully seducing the officer and infiltrating the Nazis, things get more complicated when Rachel begins to fall in love with the surprisingly thoughtful and good-natured Müntze. After her family is killed, she joins an underground resistance force run by a former surgeon named Hans Akkermans (Thom Hoffman) and an older freedom fighter named Gerben Kuipers (Derek de Lint). The film itself tells the story of a Jewish woman named Rachel Stein (Carice van Houten) living the Netherlands during the Nazi regime. So when it was announced that the Dutch native had retreated from Hollywood and returned to the Netherlands to make an intimate World War II character study titled 'Black Book,' it posed an interesting question for critics and audiences alike - would the pulpy director be able to balance his affinity for extremist behavior with the historical gravity of Nazi genocide? ![]() Writer/director Paul Verhoeven is known for pushing the envelope with his films, whether it be in the form of ultra-violent imagery (' Robocop'), graphic sexual content (' Basic Instinct'), or pure unadulterated trash ('Showgirls'). ![]()
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