Soldier of Orange

Rating:
Summary: "A Dutch Treat"
Review: "Soldier of Orange" is the story of several young residents of the Netherlands who become involved in World War II. I believe it is the best film directed by Paul Verhoeven - far better than anything he has made since coming to the U.S. from the Netherlands. Rutger Hauer is also excellent in the film. A VHS version of this film was available some years ago in the U.S. but letterboxing brings the film back to its original theater experience. This film is absolutely in my "Top 10" of all time list.

Rating:
Summary: "A Dutch Treat"
Review: "Soldier of Orange" is the story of several young residents of the Netherlands who become involved in World War II. I believe it is the best film directed by Paul Verhoeven - far better than anything he has made since coming to the U.S. from the Netherlands. Rutger Hauer is also excellent in the film. A VHS version of this film was available some years ago in the U.S. but letterboxing brings the film back to its original theater experience. This film is absolutely in my "Top 10" of all time list.

Rating:
Summary: Good Job
Review: After a long moratorium, I am most pleased that this DVD finally came around. Some of you may already know that the LaserDisc copy suffered from deterioration known as laser-rot. Most frustrating.

I've always been a big fan of Paul Verhoeven and this is a big accomplishment! I liked the music, the acting and the transfer to DVD is pretty darn good !

I've been waiting a long time for this one to arrive on DVD and it finally paid off. Thanks everyone !

rcc

Rating:
Summary: Wonderful Film on the subject
Review: As a history lover and a despiser of hollywood hack jobs on history i am glad to see that the international movie industry gets it almost perfect. You are sucked into the passion of the movie within the first half hour and you are glued to your seat for the rest of the movie a must buy for independent and international movie lovers as well as WWII buffs

Rating:
Summary: Verhoeven shows his respect to eric hazelhoff roelfzema
Review: Based on the book by dutch resistance fighter eric hazelhoff roelfzema,turning out the best raw screenplay verhoeven could work on .

Rating:
Summary: It's history
Review: For all the US viewers,
The story is based on facts.
The writer of the story is the same caracter that Rutger Hauer plays.
If some of you visits Holland, you must go to Leiden.
That is the city where the college is in this movie.
Among the names written on the wall is Sir Winston Churchill.
The name of the author is slightly changed from Erik Hazelhoff Roelfzema into Erik Lanshoff.
So, if some of you might ask yourself if it's history or Hollywood, it's absolutely history.

Rating:
Summary: A great movie that tells a more or less true story
Review: Great movie and we see it coming back on television here in Holland every year around this time (the Germans invaded Holland om May 10th 1940 and were officially kicked out by the Canadians om May 5th 1945). But I had to have the DVD to be able to watch it the next 50 years or so!
Keep in mind when you buy this DVD that the story more or less really happened. Erik Hazelhoff Roelfzema, on who the main character of Erik Lanshof (Rutger Hauer) in the movie is based, is even still alive today.

Don't expect sound and visual effects like in Star Wars, this is an old movie, but I guess it was enhanced as much as possible when it was put on DVD. I personally like that everyone in the movie speaks his own language, so you won't have to listen to German Soldiers speaking English, etc. As a Dutchman I found it annoying though that the English subtitles cannot be switched off.

Rating:
Summary: Great movie
Review: I couldn't buy this DVD in the Netherlands (had to buy it in the UK)... what kind of crazy world is this? :s

Anyway, the movie starts with a recording of queen Wilhelmina stepping out an airplane at the army airport "Valkenburg" (near Leiden) at the end of the WWII. She's accompanied by Eric Hazelhoff-Roelzema, adjudant to the queen and soldier of Orange. The movie tells the story of Eric Hazelhoff-Roelzema (Eric Lanshof in the movie). He studied law in Leiden and was in fact one of the last students to graduate at Leiden University during the second world war. He also was a member of the Dutch resistance. Eventhough the movie and the book he wrote about the war are not very similar, the situation and circumstances of the war in Holland are nicely shown.

In Leiden you can still see the room right accross the Academy Building, where Eric lived at the beginning of the war.

A great movie for its time. Not as good as warfilms like Schindler's List; the Pianist; or The Band of Brothers series, but good nonetheless. The music of Rogier van Otterloo is just perfect. For a Leidener and lawstudent in Leiden as myself, a must have!

Rating:
Summary: Not Quite
Review: I first saw "Soldier of Orange" in the early '80s and remembered it as a well-made, intelligent war/action film. I looked forward to seeing it again, both to see if my memory was justified and to answer a question that had been nagging me for several years. Nothing about my memory of the film suggested much similarity to the subsequent work of its director, Paul Verhoeven. So I was curious to see what, if anything, looked forward to his other films.

That question was answered in the first sequence, as the protagonist, Eric (Rutger Hauer) is initiated into the boyish antics of university life. As punishment for trying to shirk the hazing, Eric's future friend Gus (Jeroen Krabbe) smashes a bowl of soup over his head. As Eric falls to the floor unconscious, the blood, noodles and broth mingle in a mess on the floor. This combined carnality and violence is Verhoeven's signature, and while the film doesn't have as much sex as some of the director's later work, it otherwise is in keeping with his almost obsessive fixation on sensuality.

Still, the DVD was vaguely disappointing, partly because the transfer is rather dark. More fundamentally, while "Soldier" is indeed intelligent, it may be too sophisticated for its own good. We get a believably broad look at the range of reactions among the Dutch to the Nazi occupation, from resistance, to acquiescence, to active collaboration. Far from the flawless heroes of Hollywood, Eric, Gus and their friends are frail, fearful, heroic almost by accident. The problem is, these Realistically drawn characters do not make very compelling centers for an epic. We may sympathize, even recognize a bit of ourselves, but it's hard to get excited by action caused as much by the characters' blunders as by their intentions.

Yet despite these Realistic details, the characters drop in and out of the story so frequently it's difficult to recognize who they are. This fragmentation of the relationships may be necessary to preserve the forward movement of the action, but the result is neither a compelling war drama, nor an insightful exploration of character. Only Gus and Eric are portrayed in any depth, but that doesn't help either, since they are marked as much by their posing and vacillation as by their heroism.

The film moves quickly, and despite the messiness of the story, no one will be bored by it. You are equally unlikely, however, to be very satisfied by it. In the last scene, one of the other characters says to Eric about his wartime experiences "I survived." (I'm not giving anything away, here, incidentally, since the film starts in flashback.) That comment summarizes the film's interests and limitations. "Soldier of Orange" is ultimately not about Idealistic Heroes proving themselves but the grubby realities of getting on in an ugly situation. Interesting, perhaps, but not an epic.

Rating:
Summary: Real people, real events.....
Review: I first saw SOLDIER OF ORANGE several years ago and then rewatched it this week. My reaction to the film on the second viewing was very different. I've visited the Netherlands many times (my mother was Dutch descent) and have known for years Rotterdam was leveled by the Nazis. Since it has been completely rebuilt, the sadness of the WWII bombing for me until now has been that I could no longer visit the lovely old buildings that existed before the war. How shallow I have been.

I live 5 blocks from the Pentagon, and on Sept. 11 when I drove home from work, I saw first hand the aftermath of an act of war. (My husband saw the blast from his office window.) I have friends who were in NYC or the at the Pentagon on Sept. 11. My friend Mike was in NYC for a meeting and packing to return when he heard the first explosion. As the first tower fell, he ran like mad from the Marriott that used to be in the WTC complex. Mike was barefooted and cut his feet to pieces. I asked him why he did not slip on his shoes before he ran. He says he did not want to appear in public wearing loafers with no socks. As Mike ran body parts rained down on him. He is shaking and breaks down in tears everytime he talks about it, but his psychiatrist tells him to keep talking about it.

So, when I watched SOLDIER OF ORANGE last night, and I saw Rutger Hauer's reaction to seeing body parts and broken babbling people after a Nazi bombing, I understood how little I had known before Sept. 11 and that bravery is relative. Some people like Donald Rumsfield stay on the job and pull people out of the wreckage. Some people run like mad. Some hide until the dust clears. Not until terrible events occur do any of us know how we will react.

Verhoeven's rendering of SOLDIER OF ORANGE is brilliant. The story concept is straighforward--follow the experiences of an ordinary group of young Dutch men who are all friends at university, who over the course of the film experience the halcyon days of college life and the destruction of their homeland via war and its aftermath.

Verhoeven shows how each of these young men reacts to events beyond their control. These are ordinary men in extraordinary circumstances. A few of them do end up in uniform (opposing sides). One man cannot stand to see a Jew mistreated and he intervenes to his sorrow. Another has a German mother so he joins the Nazis. One is Jewish and must attempt an escape. Another hides out and continues his eductation, acquiring his degree behind closed doors. Another dies in a concentration camp. Yet another joins the RAF after a series of misadventures and becomes a hero.

Someone once said to me they thought Tom Hanks was miscast in Speilberg's RYAN, to which I replied, but he's just like my Uncle Paul who received a battlefield commission and a chest full of medals when he was the last man standing in a fight in southern France. Gentle Uncle Paul who went home to Illinois after the war, resumed his life as a printer and never did another bold thing.

I think this story is fabulous--an exploration of how real people behave during unreal times, which Verhoeven seems to understand. My DVD is excellent with vivid shots of the Netherlands and England twenty years ago when folks still rode bicycles. What a hoot to see a troop of soldiers on bikes!! (The film contains some hilarious scenes, even in war funny things happen.) The DVD contains a commentary with Verhoeven and others similar to the CRITERION films.