Verhoeven showing what's real rather than just making fun of what's not

Rating: 9/10 (17 August 2008)

I watched it last night and thought it was far more successful than 'Soldaat Van Oranje'. Zwartboek really put over the blurred lines and confusion of resistance and collaborators and was full of detail and events. The other film has loads of that "provocation" he's famous for, a poke in the ribs seemingly without reason or need. I understand, I think, what he was doing. It seems to me to be part of the Dutch character to strip all things down to what they really are; to what is real. His provocation was a poke in the ribs, but really one that bursts a bubble, to show instead (or beneath to) what is real. I see his method but it still just feels like a poke in the ribs to me! With Zwartboek he has a mature voice, not needing the farce elements of the earlier film, but showing reality in all its complexity and at the same time fleshing it out with character and his characters. I think it's my 2nd favourite Dutch film, after 'Father And Daughter'.