Historically good, but...

Rating: 8/10 (8 July 2007)

Although mostly a downer, I thoroughly enjoyed this film except for one stinging implausibility: that of the liberating Canadian Colonel cooperating with German General Käutner.
After Canadians experienced Nazi 'honor' via Dieppe, Ortona, the Abbey Ardenne, the Battle for the Scheldt Estuary, and seeing the starved Dutch people, I find it impossible to believe that a Canadian officer would respect such a pre-capitulation order by a defeated Nazi scum.
Other than this incongruity, the film's depiction of the mixed and often ephemeral allegiances of a many Dutch civilians, the double-crossing by some, the idealism of others, in the nightmare vortex of Nazi occupation was certainly illuminating.
I wonder if citizens of my own country, Canada, would do any better when faced by such a tragic situation as those of the Netherlands experienced in the five full years from May 10, 1940 to May 5, 1945.