Two decades as Hollywood's most reliably misunderstood filmmaker was
enough for Paul Verhoeven, it seems. We Americans failed to comprehend
that Showgirls was intentionally funny, and we somehow perceived his
blatantly anti-fascist satire Starship Troopers as promoting fascism, so
to hell with us in his opinion. Black Book marks both Verhoeven's return
to his native Holland (first time since 1983) and his return to the subject of World War II
(first time since 1979), but his perverse streak remains wholly intact:
This is a story of the Dutch resistance in which the Nazis frequently seem
more sympathetic — or at least no more repugnant — than those who fight them.
Only our heroine, plucky German-Jewish refugee Rachel (Carice van Houten),
earns our admiration, and that by her willingness to seduce and schtup a
Gestapo bigwig (Sebastian Koch, also currently visible as the noble
playwright in The Lives of Others) in the name of espionage. Nor does it
exactly hurt that she'll get gorgeously naked at the drop of a hat.
Widely acclaimed as a bravura return to form at last fall's Venice and
Toronto festivals, Black Book suffers from the same unfortunate
discrepancy between brilliant conception and dodgy execution as most of
Verhoeven's Hollywood efforts — the only real difference is that his
intentions seem clearer for some reason when everyone's speaking in
subtitles. Give some folks the mildly risqué image of a woman dyeing her
pubic hair blonde and they'll willingly overlook the fact that 80% of the
movie plays exactly like the Volker Schlöndorff version would have,
hitting its genre marks with brisk efficiency and little more. Still,
Schlöndorff is no slouch, and Black Book is thoroughly enjoyable right up
until it gets all überplotty in its endlessly expository final half-hour,
with every damn scene offering a new Scooby-Doo-style revelation. (Even
the tired Fallacy of the Talking Killer gets some play.) In years to come,
it'll be remembered primarily for introducing the world to Carice van
Houten, who holds the screen with a confidence and ferocity that marks her
as an instant star. Stay in Holland, Carice. — Mike D'Angelo