Talk:Black Book (film)

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Former good articleBlack Book (film) was one of the good articles, but it has been removed from the list. There are suggestions below for improving the article to meet the good article criteria. Once these issues have been addressed, the article can be renominated. Editors may also seek a reassessment of the decision if they believe there was a mistake.
Article milestones
DateProcessResult
January 7, 2007WikiProject peer reviewReviewed
January 10, 2007Good article nomineeListed
April 11, 2007Good article reassessmentDelisted
Current status: Delisted good article

Fatherland vs Homeland[edit]

In the section "Production", I changed 'Paul Verhoeven moved to his fatherland' to Paul Verhoeven moved to his homeland. This therm is more appropriate. The article Fatherland) explains why; Drawing from the Nazis' usage of the term "Vaterland", the direct English translation "fatherland" featured in news reports associated with Nazi Germany and in domestic anti-Nazi propaganda during World War II. As a result, the English word is now associated with the Nazi government of Germany (unlike in Germany itself, where the word means simply "homeland") The word is not used often in post-World War II English unless one wishes to invoke the Nazis, or one is translating literally from a foreign language where that language's equivalent of "fatherland" does not bear Nazi connotations.217.136.184.180 05:28, 5 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Wow![edit]

Add some fair use rationales and get this peer reviewed. This article looks like it should easily pass the Good Article review process.--Supernumerary 02:39, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I added the fair use rationales, hopefully they suffice. - Ilse@ 20:43, 6 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
They're mostly there, but they're missing the "lower quality" and "does not impede ability to market" clauses. See here for a summary, and here for a poster example, and here for a screenshot.--Supernumerary 22:10, 6 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for your help. I changed the texts and I believe the clauses mentioned are now included in the rationales. - Ilse@ 22:37, 6 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Behind the story and critics sections[edit]

I think that the sections are fine they way they are now. One gives the views of the makers and the other the views of the critics. These are two different but important viewpoints, which justifies any overlap. On a side note, I would suggest changing "Behind the story" to "Origins" and making it the first subsection of production.--Supernumerary 18:59, 28 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

GA recommendations[edit]

Good article certainly, but I would recommend that the see also heading be deleted and the link to the soundtrack given a section in the production, because I'd prefer a lead to that article. Wiki-newbie 19:50, 8 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I added a 'Soundtrack' section. - Ilse@ 00:42, 9 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Please remove the cast names from the plot summary. Wiki-newbie 20:14, 9 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I would like to refer to the style guidelines of the WikiProject Films. These guidelines say actor names should be included between parentheses in the premise of the plot section. - Ilse@ 21:38, 9 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I feel it is redundant to write who's who twice. Wiki-newbie 16:45, 10 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Some people even want the names in a third time, see Peer review/Black Book (film)#Plot. I think we can agree on the redundancy of that... - Ilse@ 17:00, 10 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Any other recommendations? - Ilse@ 17:02, 10 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

No, you have passed. Wiki-newbie 20:41, 10 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Yikes. I just saw the film, so my memory of it is fairly fresh but I'm not sure enough to change this article. However, I have my doubts about this article being listed as a good article because IMHO, the summary has a number of factual errors or misleading plot descriptions:

  • Müntze is arrested and sentenced to death for secretly making a cease fire deal with the Dutch Underground, not because he refused to execute people. Also as an important plot point, he's implicated by Franken, who is getting his information from a mole inside the Dutch Underground. This also occurs AFTER the members of the resistance have been arrested and tortured, but the sentence ordering confuses this plot point.
  • The bug in the office isn't "discovered, but rather its presence is betrayed by the mole (More precisely, the discovery of the bug isn't explicitly shown, but it seems likely that the bug's existance is made known by the mole.)
  • The black book does NOT contain the name of traitors (well except for the Doctor's name.) It contains the names of wealthy Jews who are trying to escape and the amounts of money they have.
  • In the attempted rescue of the enprisoned members of the underground, only two rescuers survive and all the prisoners die, which far worse than implied by "most prisoners and rescuers are killed."
  • The placement of the sentence "Ronnie is a woman who copes with each situation by acquiescing" is confusing since it comes in the paragraph about the flash forward.
  • It's not clear from the plot summary, that Akkermans is attempting leave Holland by smuggling himself and his loot inside a coffin.
  • It's more encyclopedic to refer to a person by their last name. Here, the article refers to "Rachel" throughout the article, but uses last names for other characters in the film.
  • Missing from the plot summary, is the implication that the Kibbutz was funded by the stolen war loot. That could be construed as morally ambiguous.

The plot section is in serious need of a rewrite. Clemwang 09:05, 15 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Although you say that you are not sure enough to change this article, it looks like you are well enough informed to currently be the most suitable person to make the changes.--Patrick 11:30, 2 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Kibbutz[edit]

Question - having seen the movie, I was wondering if anyone knew where the kibbutz is supposed to be in Israel? It looks like its by the lake of Galilee, but wouldn't that be too far away from the fighting of the Suez crisis to be affected? Maybe someone can help - thanks!

The kibbutz scenes was filmed at Kfar Ruppin -- LamontCranston 15:26, 15 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

un realistic[edit]

parts of the film are un realistic like the scene where rachels charachter tells ronnie the collabarator secretary that she works for the resistance in real life that would be something you would not tell anyone also the scene where muntze gets executed by the germans after liberation by the allies also if anckermann wanted to keep rachel quiet why not just keep her in prison rather than have her released and wouldnt late 1944 be a bad time to start working for the germans when it was obvious to everyone they were losing the war and the scene where rachel dyes her pubic hair was unneccesary even on natural blondes these dont always match one bit that was realistic was ronnie who latched on to an allied soldier as soon as they rolled into town this seemed the cleverest thing to do Bouse23 15:31, 6 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

It may seem extraordinary, but in real life there was a firing-squad execution carried out by German POWs, for desertion, at Schellingwoude north of Amsterdam in May 1945. This event has served as the inspiration for fiction before, in the final episode of the tv series Secret Army broadcast in 1979. Jheald (talk) 09:50, 14 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]
An extended discussion of the circumstances, noting that there were a number of such cases, can be found in Chris Madsen (1993), Victims of Circumstance: the Execution of German Deserters by Surrendered German Troops Under Canadian Control in Amsterdam, May 1945, Canadian Military History, 2(1) 93–113.
A 1996 Dutch newspaper article about the case can also be found here Jheald (talk) 11:27, 14 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]
In this interview, Verhoeven discusses some more of the real-life elements behind the story:

Müntze was based on an actual character named Münt; the lawyer is real; the doctor with the black book is based on a Mr. De Boer. On the other hand, the doctor’s relationship with Rachel is invented, and Rachel’s relationship with Müntze is derived from one of three women we used as a composite to create her character; this woman also had a thing with a German officer, but a different one than Münt. Some of them were in Rotterdam and some in The Hague, so we put them together. Only Rachel was assembled from three different characters... Only one of the women was Jewish. None of the three survived the war. Another example of this blend of fact and fiction is the escape by coffin near the end of the film. It was based on an actual event, but it didn’t happen to this person. The actual guy escaped to Spain with a lot of pearls and cash in the coffin with him. We came upon this pamphlet about him in our research.

From this review:

Materials [the filmmakers] found in the Netherlands Institute for War Documentation indicated how the Resistance secretly negotiated with the head German officer (Müntze in the movie, Münt in reality), sometimes offering rare stamps and ceasefires in exchange for prisoners. “Münt was certainly ‘negotiating with the enemy,' as it's called in the movie by the German general,” says Verhoeven. “He was trying to make deals and partially succeeded in making deals with the Resistance so that they would stop sniping at German officers and soldiers.”

More details can be found in this interview, from the film's official press kit:

All the story lines in Black Book have their basis in true events. Most characters are based on real people.

Did the ‘black book’ ever exist? You mean the so-called ‘little black book’? Absolutely. Plenty has been written about it. Gerard first came across it in the book Moordenaarswerk by Hans van Straten that was published in the 60s. Gerard immediately thought it was a good start for a script. The ‘little black book’ was the diary of a Mr De Boer, a lawyer in The Hague who was shot in the Goudenregenstraat just after the war. The killers were never found. During the war, De Boer negotiated between the German army command in The Hague and the resistance to try and prevent unnecessary bloodshed. The resistance would assassinate people and the Germans would exact revenge by shooting hostages in the street. When I was six years old, I was made to walk past those bodies. De Boer’s black book, which probably contained names of traitors and collaborators - all the way to the top - was never found.

... When we researched [Soldier of Orange], we came across some remarkable events in The Hague in the last years of the war. About SD officer Munt and Frank of the Sonderkommando. Those stories didn’t fit with Soldier of Orange, but they’ve now been incorporated into Black Book

... the report Kamptoestanden by Dutch Nazi party member reverend [Hendrik Willem] Van der Vaart Smit, who was imprisoned after the war, which gives prisoners’ accounts of abuse and mistreatment in those camps. We have weaved some of those stories into Black Book. This is what makes the film so provocative, because nobody has yet shown how we treated our prisoners in 1945.

... Are Rachel and Ronnie also inspired by real people? In Rachel a number of people have been merged. Both resistance fighters like Esmée van Eeghen and Kitty ten Have, as well as an artist like Dora Paulsen. Gerard and I fused them into one character. Ronnie’s character is fictional, but in those days there were a lot of girls like that. Those, who went wherever the wind blew them. Politically she’s very naïve. Many people on both sides were at that time.

57 year old lawyer H. de Boer was found murdered in the Hague on 30 May 1945. An interview with his son about the murder can be found here (audio, in Dutch).
Dutch wikipedia gives a number of possible precedents for raids on detention centres.
Interviews also stress the reality of a shades-of-grey depiction of some of the resistance, rather than the older black-and-white picture of heroism, with reference to more recent historical treatments.
Dutch National Archives has a short interview with Gerard Soeteman about the true historical material in his screenplay for the film here Jheald (talk) 13:41, 14 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Jheald (talk) 12:28, 14 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Being released in america[edit]

The movie is going to be released in america on april 4 2007 according to boxofficemojo.com shouldn't this be in the article —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 84.25.182.213 (talk) 14:21, 15 March 2007 (UTC).[reply]

The release date April 6 is mentioned in the infobox. - Ilse@ 13:20, 18 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

GA/R[edit]

Somebodies filed a Good Article review over this article, over as-of-yet undefined concerns of the accuracy of the plot section. Homestarmy 17:03, 15 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Rachel's last name[edit]

The official Dutch website for the film lists Rachel's last name as "Steinn," while the US one lists it as "Stein" with one "n" - As I recall, the entries of her family's name are listed as "Stein" in the black book. Anyone know what the correct spelling should be? Cheers, Mabuse 14:54, 4 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

My revert[edit]

The reason I reverted the edits by Jhyman1122 twice are that his plot summary is just not a neutral summary written in a formal register. For example, I believe to end a summary with the words "That is a movie everyone must see" is inappropriate in an encyclopedic article. Furthermore, I have the suspicion that it is copied from a newspaper article since it starts with a date and ends with a recommendation. Opinions, anyone? Blur4760 06:54, 22 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Meaning of the Movie[edit]

What does the film mean? Why did the director insist on the filming the short clip at the end in Israel even though there were close to bankruptcy? One thing questionable is the coffin-killing at the end, it even makes them out to be after the loot. It is almost like one of those classic movies where a certain piece of jewelery attracts death wherever it goes. But without a certain jewel being highlighted it may hope to address broader issues of treachery, double dealing, selling-out etc. ones in which we're still complicit. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.203.54.231 (talk) 00:47, 12 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

quality of quote translations in "Critical reaction" section[edit]

Several parts of this article appear to have been written by non-native English-speakers (probably Dutch, given the word order errors), and I have made numerous minor corrections. However, the translations of quotes from the Dutch press in the "Critical reaction" section are of glaringly low quality, and probably require complete retranslation. Anyone up for the job?
--Yumegusa (talk) 11:57, 1 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

My plot changes after seeing movie[edit]

I just saw it couple hours ago and it was quite a movie so I couldn't help whipping through while the plot was fresh and correcting a bunch of little (and big) things, per edit summary. CarolMooreDC (talk) 07:02, 4 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

When is 'Enough' Enough?[edit]

Mr Verhoeven is a passionate man who loves his country and his country women and men, but really, there seems to be the same problem in this Movie as in Natural Born Killers. Mr Stone is as passionate for his fellow Americans as Mr Verhoeven is for his, in NBK people are shot, stabbed, raped, burned alive, decapitated, beaten senseless. In Black Book characters are shot, robbed, drugged, raped, tortured, drowned in sh*t, beaten to a pulp. Being ruled by the Nazi's was no party, but look into Dutch History and you see they suffered 10 times more when ruled by Spain. Mr Verhoeven and his team has served their country well in helping to come to terms with their national trauma. That is the most important contribution actors make to Society.Johnwrd (talk) 01:24, 26 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Flashback structure[edit]

Has Verhoeven ever said why this was used? It removes all dramatic tension about whether or not two characters will survive, despite being placed in great danger in the main body of the film. Lovingboth (talk) 12:51, 2 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

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