Black Book (2007)

This was so god-awful, a tacky exploitation film wrapped in a virtuous package about a Jewish woman in World War II Holland working with the Resistance. It had nothing to do with any of that. It's the exact same cliché-ridden formula of every stupid, violent, sexist action film that is churned out by the dozen every year. You could stick the plot and the characters in any setting, any time period and it would be exactly the same. I really despair for the intelligence of the IMDb community--this movie was so dumb, so cheesy, words just fail me. Plus it was extremely insulting to Jews and women, SPOILER ALERT: as if a Jewish woman who'd seen her entire family mowed down by the Gestapo would fall in love with the head of the Gestapo????!!!! Give me a f...ing break!!!

I am trying really hard to remember a World War II movie that is worst than this one! And believe me... I have seen a lot, from many different countries.Really poor acting by Carice Van Houten and some other actors combined with a boring script that tried really hard to be subversive but didn't make it. The 5 stars I gave were ONLY for the production, the director of photography and the acting of Sebastian Koch & Christian Berkel.If you want to see a good WWII movie about Europe I would recommend "The Cranes Are Flying" (1957), "Come And See" (1985) or even "The Pianist" (2002) but definitely NOT "Black Book".

Before he dazzled Hollywood with his blood-soaked satires Robocop (1987) and Starship Troopers (1997) - and made us cringe with Basic Instinct (1992) and Showgirls (1995) - director Paul Verhoeven made Soldier of Orange (1977) in his native Netherlands, a film about the Dutch resistance movement during World War II which starred Rutgher Hauer. Almost thirty years later, and only six years since Hollow Man (2000) seemed to drain him of his creativity, Verhoeven returned to his homeland to make Zwartboek (Black Book), and to again highlight his country's heroic struggle during the Nazi occupation.In 1944, Dutch Jew Rachel Stein (Carice van Houten), a singer living in Berlin before the war, hides from the Nazi regime in the war-torn Netherlands. When the farmhouse she was hiding in is destroyed by the Americans, she is forced to flee, reuniting with her family before setting off by boat to the safer south. However, the boat is ambushed by the Nazis and Rachel narrowly escapes with her life, watching her entire family murdered in the process. Lost and alone, she decides to join the resistance in The Hague, where her many talents are put to good use. A chance meeting on a train leads her to charming the socks off high-ranking Nazi officer Ludwig Muntze (Sebastian Koch), so Rachel, under the guise of Ellis de Vries, is given the task of seducing him.World War II movies seem to be made with one of two intentions. One is to delve into the human soul and explore the horrors of battle, and the other is to simply entertain. Verhoeven's movie seems to lie somewhere in between, and the results are intriguing to say the least. Too often does the drama get interrupted by an unnecessary gun battle or explosion for the film to be taken too seriously, but, even at 145 minutes, Black Book is never in danger of dragging. It also never misses an opportunity to get van Houten in the nude, but to anyone familiar with the work of Paul Verhoeven, this will come as no surprise. While the actress now most famous as Melisandre the Red Priestess in Game of Thrones is staggeringly beautiful, her constant clothes-shedding hardly serves the plot or her character.In fact, Black Book asks a hell of a lot of van Houten, who is forced to don a number of faces and personalities as her character digs herself deeper into the role of secret agent and uncovers betrayals and secret plots at every turn. She handles it exceptionally well, and van Houten really should have gone on to be a A-lister after this. She has a sparkling chemistry with Koch, who is also very good as the man on the side facing defeat, hoping to agree a truce with the resistance to avoid more bloodshed. It's a handsomely shot film all round, made all the more staggering that this was conceived on such a modest budget, and it's clear that Verhoeven was out to make a movie he could be proud of. While his familiar exploitative approach prevents it from being great, Black Book is never boring and is peppered with enough grey characters (Verhoeven certainly doesn't white-wash the portrayal of his fellow Dutch) to keep the twists and turns coming until the very end.

Paul Verhoeven co-wrote and directed this tremendous undertaking, Black Book (Zwartboek), a Dutch film from 2006. This is a big, sprawling film about World War II and the travails of a Jewish woman, Rachel Stein.The film starts on a kibbutz in Israel, where Rachel (Carice van Houten) is living and teaching, when she runs into a tourist (Halina Reijn) who knew her during the war. Rachel thinks back to those days, when she was hiding with a Christian family until their house was bombed. She then meets someone from the Resistance who helps her get a boat into free territory. Tragedy strikes.Rachel begins to work with the Resistance who have her dye her hair and give her fake I.D. as Ellis deVries. While on a train, she meets a German officer, Muntze (Sebastian Koch). He seems interested in her, so the Resistance asks her to go undercover.A very suspenseful and scary film that makes the point that not only can't you trust everyone, but that not everyone was out to help the greater good - sometimes only themselves. And within the Nazi regime, there were real baddies and some not so bad. An interesting take.The film is carried by Carice van Houten, an absolutely beautiful woman who is one heck of an actress. I frankly preferred her with her natural dark hair; with her blond hair, she bore a resemblance to Annie Potts, which I found disconcerting. Nevertheless, she was pretty fantastic in a real workhorse role.The rest of the cast was very effective. Extremely absorbing film that, despite its length, will keep you watching.