Simon (2004)

This film is extremely well elaborated. Without spoiling the movie for you, basically, Simon is a sad story between a drug-dealing, "living la vida loca" young man, and a gay man he unexpectedly met.14 years later, they meet again, but this time, the situation is totally different.The filmmakers do an excellent job at the beginning of the movie, that is, making people dive deep into the story, the characters and the general atmosphere. This has as consequence, later after the middle of the movie, that the filmmakers start playing with the audience's emotions, leveraging on all the details presented during the beginning to force the audience into the main topic of the movie.The second half of the movie is the sad part of it. There, the lives of all the people involved are bound together by an unexpected tragedy. The film has an obvious ending, but during that time, the audience's feelings and emotions are constantly touched and moved. This emotional play is perfect for the deep meanings of the movie: a reflexion and the presenting of different perspectives of homosexuality, drugs, sex and eutanasia.

This movie is about an unlikely friendship. Right at the start of it you learn that one of them is gay and polite, and the other is an outspoken, humorous heterosexual that has cancer, and might die sometime soon. The movie then goes back and forth along some fourteen years, starting with the day these guys met.Sounds simple? You are in for some surprises. This is not just a film about a guy that is quite obnoxious and irresistibly lovely at the same time. It is also about being yourself, shy or not, and living in a country that has more tolerance to cultural diversity. But mostly about this man that always tries to do the right thing, and enjoy his life, and have a laugh with his friends, even as it looks like death might come sooner than expected. I love this guy. And the Netherlands never looked that much beautiful on film.

This is one of those movies that combines the best of two genres: comedy and drama. It starts as a hilarious story when an Amsterdam coffeeshop owner (Simon) runs over a homosexual student (Camiel). It turns out to be the start of a long, unusual and moving friendship.The comedy element is mostly coming from Simon. Not only because of his jokes about Camiel's homosexuality, but also because he has such a typical personality.Both Cees Geel and Marcel Hensema give great performances in their leading roles. But besides the actors performances, the story and especially the dialog are great.It's also a movie that couldn't have come from any other country but The Netherlands, and because it is such a typical Dutch and therefor recognizable film, it's maybe the best one ever made here! Go watch it!

Simon (Cees Geel) and Camiel (Marcel Hensema) are two opposing characters becoming friends. Marcel is gay, well-educated and polite; Simon hates gays, seems to have little education and is rude. In the beginning they meet at the height of Simon's life, as Simon has several thriving coffeehouses (where weed is on the menu) and beach cafés, Marcel is still a poor student wanting to become a dentist. 14 years onward they meet again and the roles of luck have somewhat reversed: Marcel is a working dentist now living with a male friend; Simon has gotten ill with cancer, has lost his girlfriend and by now only manages his businesses via others.It touches several themes where The Netherlands has become renowned for: A liberal attitude towards sex in general and gays in particular, with gay marriage possible (but still limited adoption possibilities and an increasing hostility towards gays by a portion of second-generation immigrant youth). A liberal policy on soft drugs, where selling and buying (small) quantities of soft drugs is formally forbidden but allowed, but where production is out of the question. And also a front runner in euthanasia, the main theme of this movie. All these themes define Dutch national identity to an extent, and therefore they are fiercely stood up for by most political parties except the more orthodox ones.Simon uses some slang used by original inhabitants of Amsterdam (By the way, who is an original inhabitant in a city that has welcomed people from all over the world for centuries?). It will however be impossible to translate, as much of the black humor and crudeness together with the dialect will not survive the translation. By the way, the director claims to portray real Amsterdam here. This is bit of a travesty, as the city is luckily more diverse with the many immigrants, artists, current stream of English and Americans and the well-off living there.There are several problems this movie has. The first one is the writing, as most of the dialog is rather stupid and infantile. For me, Simon was not just a funny rude guy, but an irritating character letting every dumb joke follow by his own laughter. And the liking of the movie stands or falls with the liking or disliking of the basically good-hearted Simon. And another side note: With the rise of AIDS in the eighties, why is that not a subject here, as several characters end up in bed with each other, among them the risk group of gays.The second one is the acting, which is traditionally bad in Dutch movies and is unfortunately up to previous standards. Nadja Hüpscher as Simon's daughter Joy for example follows the highest possible secondary education for her age group, but behaves almost like a retard and is certainly too old for the role.The lack of a movie culture in The Netherlands means there is no passing on of talent to newcomers. The Golden Ages in art are long gone. So the last problem is the director Eddy Terstall. Lacking any visual talent he comes up with a movie with almost no interesting visuals to be fond of. Take the clumsy ending for example: Simon jumps from a rock in Thailand, a poor man's visualization for death. And he is unable to structure the story in an interesting way, with the not-too-interesting flashback structure as the best on offer. The whole movie feels like a sixties flower power director's fantasy. He is however able to tell a compelling story and the final drama part of the story is the best part of the movie.The euthanasia theme is far better explored in other movies, for example in the mundane Million Dollar Baby, but even better in Mar Adentro. And the movie is a bit of a copy of Les invasions barbares.