O Primeiro Ministro

De Premier is the first film by Eric Van Looy since 'The Loft', the American adaptation of his own 2007 'Loft'. With 'The Loft' being trashed by American critics, there was a lot at stake when this picture came out. But Eric Van Looy successfully dealt with the past criticism and made an intense, suspenseful thriller, maybe even superior to his 2007 success of 'Loft'. From the first, rainy, shot of the movie on, the tone is set. You immediately feel something bad is about to happen. And the tone of the movie never changes, which is a great accomplishment. Van Looy mentioned that with 'De Premier', he wanted to make his own 'Jaws', meaning that every scene of the movie leaves you in suspense. He succeeded. Koen De Bouw, the Belgian Prime Minister, forced to kill the U.S. President (Saskia Reeves) gives a good performance. He portrays the PM in a credible way, balancing his character between helplessness and resourcefulness. The stand out performance comes from the menacing driver, played by Stijn Van Opstal. He drives the PM around and makes sure he sticks to the plan that was forced up on him. De Premier is almost perfectly directed, with some thrilling scenes, among which a bloody bathroom scene, but has one major issue: the story. First of all, kidnapping the Belgian PM to assassinate the U.S. President isn't the most credible story. But that's OK, since it made me want to watch the movie. The problem with the story is foremost the ending. The ending could have worked, if it didn't completely contradict previous events. With contradict, I don't mean to point out a plot hole or anything of that kind, it's rather that the ending doesn't match the overall suspenseful and menacing tone of the movie. The movie also tries to explain why the Belgian PM was chosen to assassinate the President and came up with some clear arguments. I just didn't buy them. If it wasn't for the great directing throughout the movie, I might have felt cheated by the ending. Nevertheless, this movie is most certainly worth your time, you'll enjoy the suspense but don't expect a satisfying climax.

I watched the first 15mins and there was not one English word, and no subtitles. Maybe that changed later on but if I do not need to know what the actors are saying, there's little point them saying it perhaps. Various discussions about the daughter, and their day ahead, maybe one of them is 'in on it'... who knows, as it was all Dutch to me. Gave up.

The good: high pace, exciting, 2 hours of hard suspense. Decent (but not overwhelming) acting performances. Dark, grim atmosphere throughout the whole movie. I didn't get bored for a second. Many similarities to De Zaak Alzheimer, but with an even higher tempo.

The not so good: bad, sometimes even corny plot twists. Certain things were just too unrealistic and could have been done better. It seems to me that either they had to cut the movie to fit within 120 minutes or they were out of money. The ending was disappointing, compared to the rest of the film.

It does make me think about how a situation like this would play out in real life. Let's hope that it never comes to that.

I so wanted to enjoy this.

I loved Koen De Bouw in Professor T and after being a bit let down with him only being a support actor in Red Light, I found this which was from the same era as P. T. with him looking rather similar.

Eventually, I found a version with English subtitles which was a help (perhaps they were hard to find as some of it was in English anyway).

Seeing a few guest stars from P. T. was a boost but the film itself was a let down and a beyond credibility but at least, unlike many films and TV shows here in the UK, it wasn't plastered with political correctness (so tired at mandatory same-sex relationships and a higher than average number of ethnic minorities in shows these days).

The music brought some suspense but unfortunately it didn't reflect the poor scenes on screen. So disappointed. Off to watch The Team now. Koen has a small role but hope his character has gravitas.

De Premier aka 'President Under Siege' is a fairly average Euro effort. The main lead of the film is fairly wooden. The plot itself is fairly straightforward yet unconvincing. Implausibility aside, there was a role in the film played by Stijn Van Opstalthat (The Driver) which I thought was outstanding. Bags of charisma and he commanded every scene he was in. I'd like to see much more of him. Aside from this performance the rest of the film is not really worth watching.