irstly, the story follows the lives of students and their involvement with the Dutch resistance. For me, I felt mixed emotions from the film. The storyline appeared to have great potential for a big blockbuster that could have sat nicely next to Defiance and Winter In Wartime on the movie shelf and while I enjoyed the film, sadly, there was much left to be desired. The German Colonel (Stass Klassen), by far led the film in the acting department. His performance was solid and at times comparable to Christoph Waltz's performance in Inglourious Basterds, but sadly, he was alone in this department. John Rhys Davis held his own but really too brief a role to help the film. David Thomas Jenkins, Craig Robert Young and the beautiful Rachel Spencer Hewitt made their presence felt, but I felt their characters lacked depth and consistency needed for them to truly grow on you and take you into their world which I put mostly down to the next part. The directing and screenplay seemed to prove the greatest inconsistency and biggest let down with the film. Maybe due to low budget. At times characters were not clearly introduced or very briefly which left me as a viewer putting 2 and 2 together a lot throughout the movie. Also the story pace was up and down like a roller-coaster sometimes dragging slowly but then moving so fast that the scene changed to hours/days ahead and left me wondering where it was at until once again putting 2 and 2 together. For me this is what hurt the story/movie the most.
There was a strong element of religious notion in the film. Religious values were incredibly important during those times and quite often determined where ones stance lied with regards to helping the Jews.
But having said all this, and it will really depend on the individual, I think overall wanting to watch for the storyline itself and to see the evil Colonel Stass in action kept me glued enough. But you will leave the seat having watched this, with the feeling it could have been so much more, in paying homage to those brave souls portrayed in the film.
