Baantjer het begin

Okay, the armosphere and sets give you the idea it really is a time warp back to the years of the story. The bad cop interrogation is unnecessary and not like Baantjer would have written a script. Also he would be disgusted by the many swearing and cursing, something he always did not like about the TV series made. Some scenes are funny and touching but leaves some questions unanswered at the end. Waldemar and Tygo play great must be stated.

I watched Baantjer Het Begin yesterday at the cinema and i was blown away, based on watching the trailer i expected it to be good and i was right. The movie is set in a dark gritty and dirty Amsterdam in 1980, full of violent cops, prostitutes and squaters. The film takes place a few days before queen Beatrix gets crowned, newbie Jurre de Cock (Waldemar Torenstra) starts his first day at the police station. And soon teams up with the experienced kinda dirty cop Tonnie (Tygo Gernandt at his best), i won't reveal too much but it's the best dutch movie i've seen in years. And political incorrect as they come, squaters getting beaten up by the police. And one hell of a brutal interrogation scene, so you don't have to worry about it having a lack of action, and the acting is top notch. They did a great job on this one, i hope the movie wins a golden calf.

Skimming rapidly over choices of what to watch I stumbled upon this little diamond in the rough. It's becoming increasingly difficult to find anything to watch these days. The entertainment industry has gone from bad to worse in recent years notably in terms of quantity versus quality. There's no shortage of what to watch but most of it's terrible. This title could have easily been looked over and lost in the thick sauce of half baked productions. But no, it came in much better than expected. And my demands are very high seeing that I lived in Amsterdam in the late 70s. I am also a stickler for historical accuracy. This one has it right nicely down to the old pre-euro currency denominations in Holland and Belgium as well as Amsterdam cop cars and uniforms of the era. Even the landmarks of a more trivial nature hold their own such as the location of one of the city's hospitals and a "telefoon" booth overlooking a RLD canal in the Jordaan (don't quite recall if there was one). The car models, license plates and taxi meters all accurate. Long story short this crime drama was incredibly accurate and directed by someone who takes great pride in depicting Amsterdam of the 80s. There were a few too many generic labyrinth like non existent alleyway scenes but otherwise historical punctuality in my opinion. I would have liked to have seen a few more easily identifiable streets such as Warmoesstraat and Zeedijk depicted but close enough. The plot built around a Buddy cop team with a ball busting chief was also quite formulaic. But not to worry there's a pretty decent twist thrown in and the plot layers mesh well too. All in all a groot thumbs up voor this one.

OK, this is not bad for Dutch standards but I don't like it either. At least it doesn't have a cast of all the popular teen soap stars of the moment like most Dutch movies. But apart from the main character being called Jurriaan de Cock this has nothing to do with the Baantjer books. It seems they only adopted this name because it's very popular in the Netherlands, but this Jurriaan de Cock seems to be a completely different person than the one from the books. Cheap action flick, film noir, blah

Amsterdam in the early 80's. Great acting, suspense and good story. Really enjoyed this!