"... on the palace for me?"
I had forgotten about this movie, I had wanted to see it ever since I heard the name Paul Verhoeven. I saw Spetters in 1980, I saw Blade Runner in 1982. And that was my first dose of Rutger Hauer, it should have been this movie. Even my mother had heard about Hauer, and she heard about this movie too, we used to spend many hours, watching all kinds of obscure or foreign movies.
Rutger Hauer is very young here, one of a group of about five students... A photograph is taken of them, and the only question is which ones will still be alive after the debacle of World War II?
Initially it seems that the Dutch resistance are bumbling, idiotic fools. They do not appear to have embraced the concept of covering their arses.
But Rutger Hauer as Eric and his good friend Guus kind of bumble their way, trying to help, sometimes, getting caught, mostly getting away by the skin of their clever teeth. Until they finally escape to Britain.
They had to develop a way of getting back into the Netherlands, and then back out again, using what looked like "PT boats", PT boat number 102. If it were PT boat number 109, that would have been JFK. I'm just wondering if that was an American PT boat or a British...
Verhoven had access to all kinds of World War II equipment, planes, tanks, personnel carriers, even some amazing cars. When you think about movies today, none of those physical vehicles exist anymore, and so, especially in the case of shows like band of Brothers, they had to actually build German, American, and British tanks. But in 1977, or possibly a year earlier when this film was being made, there were still old war surplus planes and vehicles available.
There are names given to Rutger Hauer's character, the name of an alleged spy for Germany, planted in Britain. But it is not what we, or he, think it is. But the effect is that it sends Eric up to London with a secret mission that only he knows about, but fortunately the target of this mission knew all about what Eric was going to try to do and so thankfully that mistake was never made. That might be giving away a little bit, but I'm not saying exactly what this was, watch it and find out.
It is very interesting to see how the Germans worked, contrary to the intelligence-inept Dutch, they were virtually experts at setting up every encounter. No information was let out that they didn't have complete control over.
And it takes Eric halfway through his war experience to figure this out, turn it around, and use it to his own advantage. And towards the end, he does get very good at this.
The first Verhoven film I actually saw was Spetters, "Spatterings of Grease", in 1980. At the time, a couple of friends mentioned this movie, but for some reason I neglected to see it because I thought Rutger Hauer was portraying a Nazi... I was very wrong with that assessment.
Almost 40 years later, Verhoeven made the bookend film "Zwartboek", aka Black Book, with Clarice "Red Lady" Houten, which showed yet another aspect of the Dutch underground.
And Verhoeven was qualified to write and to make these movies.
I mentioned earlier the Dutch resistance appear to be rather inept, there are a few scenes that were rather disturbing. Especially when Alex and Guus try to volunteer and the recruitment officer keeps telling them to come back in 10 days, come back in 10 days.
There is a reason why that officer appears to be caught in some temporal causality loop... I can't say any more, that scene is near the beginning of the film. Look for it. There is a rather gross and disturbing reason why that officer was acting that way.
And then, as we are shown vignettes from the beginning of the war, the Dutch army was responding to things like April fools practical jokes. And then they are just left on their own by their superiors, with no instruction as the general drives away, leaving them with nothing.
It was kind of as if these five students had to teach themselves how to become useful. Some of them did become useful like Alex and Guus. Others made mistakes like Ian, and the Germans found the exact knife to twist into Robby.
This is one of the best war movies of the 70s and there were not that many, most of the ones made during that time were exceptional: Apocalypse Now which came two years later. Catch 22, Two Mules for Sister Sara, Kelly's Heroes, M*A*SH, Patton, Rio Lobo, Johnny got his Gun, then we had religious-based, like The Hiding Place, Vross of Iron, A Bridge (way) Too Far. Force 10 from Navarone. And of course, the infamous "1941", followed by Hair, and then "More American Graffiti."
But most of those were American movies. Das Boot, the German movie, was made in 1981. Ironically, Soldier of Orange is not even listed in the IMDb topic "Top 50 war movies and TV shows of all Time"... Not a single word about it.
This film put Verhoeven on the map- his next film, Spetters, put him over the top. And then he did RoboCop, Total Recall, and Starship Troopers, which he takes elements from this film to make more effective.
Watching this movie it is hard to tell which direction Verhoven was going to jump, but he actually made excellent movies in every genre that he worked. It took me a long time to find a good release of this, and the aspect ratio is 1280 x 785, a very unusual resolution, and I haven't seen any other films made to that specification.
I had forgotten about this movie, I had wanted to see it ever since I heard the name Paul Verhoeven. I saw Spetters in 1980, I saw Blade Runner in 1982. And that was my first dose of Rutger Hauer, it should have been this movie. Even my mother had heard about Hauer, and she heard about this movie too, we used to spend many hours, watching all kinds of obscure or foreign movies.
Rutger Hauer is very young here, one of a group of about five students... A photograph is taken of them, and the only question is which ones will still be alive after the debacle of World War II?
Initially it seems that the Dutch resistance are bumbling, idiotic fools. They do not appear to have embraced the concept of covering their arses.
But Rutger Hauer as Eric and his good friend Guus kind of bumble their way, trying to help, sometimes, getting caught, mostly getting away by the skin of their clever teeth. Until they finally escape to Britain.
They had to develop a way of getting back into the Netherlands, and then back out again, using what looked like "PT boats", PT boat number 102. If it were PT boat number 109, that would have been JFK. I'm just wondering if that was an American PT boat or a British...
Verhoven had access to all kinds of World War II equipment, planes, tanks, personnel carriers, even some amazing cars. When you think about movies today, none of those physical vehicles exist anymore, and so, especially in the case of shows like band of Brothers, they had to actually build German, American, and British tanks. But in 1977, or possibly a year earlier when this film was being made, there were still old war surplus planes and vehicles available.
There are names given to Rutger Hauer's character, the name of an alleged spy for Germany, planted in Britain. But it is not what we, or he, think it is. But the effect is that it sends Eric up to London with a secret mission that only he knows about, but fortunately the target of this mission knew all about what Eric was going to try to do and so thankfully that mistake was never made. That might be giving away a little bit, but I'm not saying exactly what this was, watch it and find out.
It is very interesting to see how the Germans worked, contrary to the intelligence-inept Dutch, they were virtually experts at setting up every encounter. No information was let out that they didn't have complete control over.
And it takes Eric halfway through his war experience to figure this out, turn it around, and use it to his own advantage. And towards the end, he does get very good at this.
The first Verhoven film I actually saw was Spetters, "Spatterings of Grease", in 1980. At the time, a couple of friends mentioned this movie, but for some reason I neglected to see it because I thought Rutger Hauer was portraying a Nazi... I was very wrong with that assessment.
Almost 40 years later, Verhoeven made the bookend film "Zwartboek", aka Black Book, with Clarice "Red Lady" Houten, which showed yet another aspect of the Dutch underground.
And Verhoeven was qualified to write and to make these movies.
I mentioned earlier the Dutch resistance appear to be rather inept, there are a few scenes that were rather disturbing. Especially when Alex and Guus try to volunteer and the recruitment officer keeps telling them to come back in 10 days, come back in 10 days.
There is a reason why that officer appears to be caught in some temporal causality loop... I can't say any more, that scene is near the beginning of the film. Look for it. There is a rather gross and disturbing reason why that officer was acting that way.
And then, as we are shown vignettes from the beginning of the war, the Dutch army was responding to things like April fools practical jokes. And then they are just left on their own by their superiors, with no instruction as the general drives away, leaving them with nothing.
It was kind of as if these five students had to teach themselves how to become useful. Some of them did become useful like Alex and Guus. Others made mistakes like Ian, and the Germans found the exact knife to twist into Robby.
This is one of the best war movies of the 70s and there were not that many, most of the ones made during that time were exceptional: Apocalypse Now which came two years later. Catch 22, Two Mules for Sister Sara, Kelly's Heroes, M*A*SH, Patton, Rio Lobo, Johnny got his Gun, then we had religious-based, like The Hiding Place, Vross of Iron, A Bridge (way) Too Far. Force 10 from Navarone. And of course, the infamous "1941", followed by Hair, and then "More American Graffiti."
But most of those were American movies. Das Boot, the German movie, was made in 1981. Ironically, Soldier of Orange is not even listed in the IMDb topic "Top 50 war movies and TV shows of all Time"... Not a single word about it.
This film put Verhoeven on the map- his next film, Spetters, put him over the top. And then he did RoboCop, Total Recall, and Starship Troopers, which he takes elements from this film to make more effective.
Watching this movie it is hard to tell which direction Verhoven was going to jump, but he actually made excellent movies in every genre that he worked. It took me a long time to find a good release of this, and the aspect ratio is 1280 x 785, a very unusual resolution, and I haven't seen any other films made to that specification.