Phileine chiede scusa

Based on the popular Ducth book by Ronald Giphart, who even has a cameo appearance to say the movie is better than his own book, 'Phileine Zegt Sorry' ('Phileine Says Sorry') is a movie that has some pretty funny moments but is not very special. The humor that was there in the book sometimes works on the screen but most of the time it does not. One thing that most people do agree on is that Kim van Kooten is the perfect Phileine, and her performance is in the spirit of the book.

Still, some things just don't work on screen. The style of writer Giphart is very important in his books and director Robert Jan Westdijk has tried to translate the style to the screen. Sometimes it gives us some nice moments but very often it fails and therefore things look strange. I think the movie is fun enough to watch and Van Kooten is worth to see it, but just don't expect too much.

I have read the book and I laughed. I saw the movie on the Dutch Film Festivl and I laughed. I'm thinking back to the scene where Phileine is intending to give Max the pleasure of his life and I'm laughing. This is by far the most humoristic Dutch movie I saw in my life!

Too little depth, too bad. Following the book by Ronald Giphart word for word, this movie doesn't have much to say. It doesn't fascinate the viewer, it's just another love story that has been tried to make interesting by making the main character talk into the camera in the middle of some scenes. Makes you remember Saved by the bell and Ally McBeal. The Lead-role is played by Kim van Kooten, and if you like brunettes you'll probably like her. Good for you because the sex-scenes could make up for lack of story / plot-line. She ends up saying she's sorry for all the things she's done, big deal. This scene (which should be the climax of the movie) doesn't seem to express it's importance to the viewer. An average movie that has some humorous scenes in it and Kim van Kooten is a very attractive woman ;)

I have not read the novel but I liked this picture because of the many quick mood changes.

There are so many emotions that change quickly all the time. One time the characters in the picture are serious and then one minute later everyone is laughing. And the next minute Philene and Max have some sort of serious conversation. You maintain watching this picture because all emotions occur so fast after one another.

What I also liked in this picture was the age of the characters. It looks like they are in their mid-twenties or something. I can imagine that the same story could apply to teenagers but also to people above 60.

That's my opinion. Nice movie!

Well, I have to admit that I (like most of the people from Holland) think most of the Dutch movies are plain bad. Seriously. Most of the time, I even got a good reason for that because most Dutch movies are bad. But it wouldn't be fair if I'd call this movie bad.

Phileine zegt sorry is a very good movie to Dutch standards. OK, Ronald Giphart is definitely not the most literal Dutch writer and he really overuses sex in his books, but isn't that typical for Dutch writers? In fact, aren't Dutch movies known for that too? Turkish Delight is a good Dutch movie, yet has a lot of sex in it. Oh well, I think I should tell you what makes me like this movie, not what makes it less bad.

I think Kim van Kooten is great as Phileine. OK, she might overdo the bitchiness sometimes, but most of the time the girl's just good. She has a good timing for one-liners and even though even I (as a 16 year old... No, we're not brainless) think Ronald Giphart overuses cursing in his books, Kim van Kooten makes Phileine enjoyable to look at and listen to.

I really like the movie's soundtrack, as, throughout the movie, it just seems to fit in the place where it is.

I like a lot of the scenes in the movie, as I think there's enough emotion in it to make it an enjoyable movie. Yes, call me crazy, but I thought the end-scene was very emotional. This might be because I'm still young and I have no life-experience whatsoever, or something, but just because I'm a teenager doesn't mean I'm emotionless.

But there are some bad points in the movie too. For example, the dutch actors that pretend to be American. Bad English or American accents in a movie really irritate me, and because a lot of Dutch people don't have a perfect English accent I don't think they should be portrayed as English or American. I found this especially annoying in Kenan Raven's case. But then again, I think Kenan Raven is annoying to begin with. His face looks completely emotionless to me.

I thought some scenes in the movie were pointless. For example, you had Gulpje and the guy from the restaurant. The whole restaurant scene was rather pointless, just like a few other scenes.

But I liked most of the movie. I don't think everyone will like it as it's dutch and therefore a bit sexistic, but I do recommend it to people my age.

7/10.