This week I was surprised to see that the movie channel was showing a Dutch movie called Black Book (Zwartboek in Dutch).  Usually you don’t see any foreign movies on the regular movie channels, so I guessed that it must have been a good movie. Eager to see a Dutch movie and hear my own language on TV I got comfy on the couch and watched it.

The movie is directed by Paul Verhoeven who worked on the script for 15 years with screenwriter Gerard Soeteman.

Plot of the movie:The story is set during the final days of World War II in Holland, and follows a Jewish singer named Rachel Stein . Rachel attempts to avoid the Nazis and remains in quiet hiding until her family is brutally slain, causing her to join up with a resistance movement. On a subsequent undercover mission, Rachel crosses paths with a smitten German general named Ludwig Muntze, with whom Rachel begins a relationship in order to feed vital information back to her colleagues in the resistance. But as the action and bloodshed escalate, Rachel realizes that she has genuine feelings for Muntze, and soon she is in enormous danger.

Apparently the press has been divided about the movie. In Holland the movie got mixed reviews, but international press was much more positive. Personally I thought it was probably one of the best movies coming from my home country. They paid a lot of attention to detail and the performances of the cast were outstanding in my opinion. If you are into war or historical movies, you might want to check it out.

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