MikePadgett.com

• Director: Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck
• Germany, 2006
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Crass Hollywood remakes of European art film aren’t often successful. The big budgets, the bigger country and the biggest names tend to kill off every single cell of zeitgeist in the original. And I can see that happening here, when they get sad-jowled Nicolas Cage to emote all over this one.

A Stasi official instigates a surveillance operation on a successful playwright. Beginning with an implacable dedication to finding the evidence he needs to condemn his subject, the official instead grows to respect and perhaps envy him, with difficult consequences for both.

The Lives of Others is steeped in atmosphere, the performances are beautifully restrained and the material is worryingly relevant to our times. Top that, Weinstein. Or rather, don’t bother.

• Director: John Frankenheimer
• United States, 1998
• 

Ronin is the sort of movie whose mere suggestion would provoke a Pavlov’s Dog reaction amongst most serious moviegoers. Beautifully shot on location in Paris and France Sud and featuring a multinational cast, it was a juicy prospect on its release. But while John Frankenheimer’s direction captures that certain je ne sais quoi of Gallic style and dazzles us with dizzying car chase camerawork, the film feels peculiarly empty.

Frankenheimer was a trailblazer whose career spanned fifty years before his death in 2002. His treatment of action sequences was renowned and in Ronin, a twisting tale of the twilight world shared by mercenary ex-spies, action is everything.

But it could have been so much more. The mix of talent on display here is exciting as it is eclectic: Sean Bean, Natasha McElhone, Robert De Niro, Jean Reno, Stellan Skarsgård, Jonathan Pryce. De Niro and Reno rub along nicely together but occupy too much screen time, Bean is edgy and authentic but underused, McElhone simmers but is never allowed to boil and Pryce and Skarsgård have to disguise their scant and unappealing dialogue with impeccable accents.

• Director: Paul Verhoeven
• Netherlands, 2006
• 

With the turbulent Hollywood years behind him, Verhoeven is back in Europe and the opening salvo is a freshly energetic epic that firmly suggests Amsterdam’s finest has rediscovered his mojo.

Ironic then that the only blot in this particular black book is Verhoeven’s oldest trick: a sudden acceleration in the third act, which leaves us as breathless and confused as the indomitable heroine.

Fortunately, Zwartboek is visually eloquent and finely acted, especially by Carice Van Houten as Ellis. Comparisons with Soldier of Orange are inevitable and with a couple of new Dutch projects already in the pipeline, I for one am sighing with relief at Verhoeven’s return to form.