Twin sisters

Normally I don't see movies as good as this one. I happened across this film one night when I had nothing to do. I saw the title and thought it would be a mushy story about twin sisters...all rainbows and glitter. I was pleasantly surprised and thought the whole concept behind the story was genius. Not only is the story wonderful the movie quality is wonderful. It is now ranked among my favorite films. This movie truly embraces what it was like to be on both sides of the war. I found myself sympathizing with Anna even though I feel as negatively as I do about Hitler and Nazi Germany. I also deeply sympathized with Lotte and the suffering she and her fiancé went threw. In the end I wanted them to put it all behind them and embrace each other again.

Little prepares Lotte and Anna, twin sisters living happily with their beloved father, for what life had in store for them. After the girls' father dies, they are left alone at the mercy of relatives who separate them in an act of sheer cruelty. Lotte and Anna go through a lot in life, not knowing, at times, about one another, and spend most of their lives apart.

Lotte fares better of the two sisters. She was a frail girl growing up and her relatives dote on her since they regard her as an invalid. Lotte writes to Anna letters during the first years of being apart, but those letters are never sent. Anna, on the other hand, is made a slave, practically, as she is made to help in the family farm and is never given the opportunity to attend school until the kind priest discovers how she has been severely beaten.

The other encounter of the sisters occur too late in life. Lotte, who when first visits Anna at the place where she is employed as a maid, by a wealthy Nazi sympathizer, is appalled by the way Anna has turned out to be an anti Semite. This puts a barrier between them not to be broken until both are too old and too stubborn to recognize how wrong they both have been about the past. Their last reunion is a bitter experience, especially for Anna, who is in poor health.

This excellent Dutch film directed by Ben Sombogaart, is based on a novel by Tessa DeLoo, which was published in this country as "Twins", gets a magnificent treatment in a lavish production that covers several decades. The action is set in Holland and in Germany.

The basic reason for watching the film is the great acting the director got from Thekla Reutins and Nadja Uhl, who are seen as the young Lotte and Anna. Both these young actresses are perfect as the twins in their youth. Ellen Vogel and Gudrum Okras, on the other hand, are also effective as the older sisters have a final confrontation at a spa where both have gone for cures.

The film shows a talented director, Ben Bombogaart, doing an excellent job in this richly layered tale of sisterly love and missed opportunities.

I read the book, De Tweeling by Tessa de Loo, and I must say that the movie most certainly lived up to the high quality of the book, in some ways even surpassed it.

The movie is about two little girls, obviously twins, who tragically get separated. One to work on a farm, the other to live with rich relatives in The Netherlands to recover from her tbc. The movie then jumps to present where to two elderly sisters meet again in a spa. However, their meeting is far from loving and it becomes clear that some scar from the past obstructs the reunion of these two sisters.

The movie then brilliantly uses flashbacks to reveal the scar that has separated the two for life, and it mostly comes down to the second world war, both living and experiences it in a different way and place.

Apparently "De Tweeling" or "The Twins" has been based on a very popular Dutch novel. I'm not able to compare the movie with the book, because I haven't read it yet, but I can and will tell you something about this movie and how I feel about it.

The movie starts in the 1920's when, after the death of their parents, the two twin sisters are separated at the age of six. One of them will stay in Germany where she'll have to work hard on her uncle's farm, the other sister will live with her upper middle class Dutch aunt and uncle in Holland. For many years the girls try to contact each other but both families are able to intercept their letters and to make them believe that the other sister is dead. While they both grow older and the Second World War affects their lives in a very profound way, both try to renew their bond several times, but fail time after time because of different reasons. Only at the end of their lives, they are able to forgive and forget...

Even though the movie has its weaker moments, overall this is some very nice and touching cinema. Especially the beginning and the end of the movie are hard to forget. And even though I'm not Dutch myself (I'm from their 'little neighbor' in the South), I could easily recognize the feelings between the Germans and the Dutch. I don't know if anybody has his or her doubts about that, but the movie exactly shows it as it was during those days (not that I experienced it myself, I was born more than 30 years after the war).

If you are looking for an alternative war movie, than this is certainly something for you. By alternative I mean that you won't see any soldiers fighting or bombs exploding, but you'll get an idea of how life was for the civilians who had to try to survive during the German occupation. Another reason why I call it alternative is because the movie does not only cover the small time period of 1938-1944, the period in which Europe was in the war. It tells the story between the 1920's and the present day.

What might be a bit confusing from time to time is the fact that the actors constantly switch between German and Dutch (especially at the end of the movie). Of course, when you don't understand anything of both languages and have to read the subtitles, you won't even notice. But anyway, I must congratulate the Dutch with this movie (as a Belgian this hurts a bit, hahaha). With this one, they have a nice movie they can be proud of. I give it a 7.5/10.

"De Tweeling" is more than just another WW II drama and truly adds something and is made interesting by a very good story.

The story is truly the power of this movie. It shows the perspective of WW II from the Dutch as well as the German side, which makes this movie really interesting and powerful. It shows how the twin sisters that already didn't had any contact for years are driven further out of each other because of WW II. It doesn't only show the Nazi-German military perspective of war but also that of the German civilians and in a way helps you to understand why so many Germans supported the Nazi's in WW II. It's a shame that there are still some "typical book elements" present in the movie that I sure work fine in the book but not in the movie, including the typical book ending (I say no more.).

The acting is for especially Dutch standards pretty high. Jeroen Spitzenberger acts magnificent but of course also the German actors pull of very well.

There are some excellent and impressive scene's. The movie doesn't show any gore or horror of WW II but focuses on the emotional effects of it on individuals and especially the twin sisters of course, of which one grew up in the Netherlands and the other in Germany. It doesn't only show the effects of the relationship between the two during the war but also long after it.

I even like it a bit better as "The Pianist".

9/10

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