La toma del poder

I always find it amusing, when US "critics" write about "realism" in a European production, whereas approx. 75 per cent of Hollywood productions are everything BUT realistic. This goes also time and again and often enough for poor acting and directing.

The pace in this flick from the Netherlands ist OK, the acting maybe average, direction is OK, the storyline could be worse, agreed.

And, so? It's not a Hollywood-blockbuster (whatever THAT is supposed to be) and we do not have the humongous budgets over here to pull a flick like TOP GUN MAVERICK.

Nuthin' personal though, so chill.

Greetings from good 'ole Europe.

This Dutch cyber-thriller is centred on Mel Bandison; an ethical hacker who has been employed to check the software on a new driverless bus system. She discovers it has been compromised and her work to correct this upsets some very dangerous people. Soon she has been framed for a murder and is on the run from both the police and criminals. If she is to clear her name and find safety she will have to work with other hackers to find the evidence that proves she was framed.

If you've seen just about any other movie featuring hackers you'll spot plenty of genre clichés here. Whether or not you can enjoy the film depends on whether you can suspend your disbelief and ignore the more far-fetched moments for ninety minutes or not. I enjoyed much of the film and thought the tension ramped up nicely towards the end. There isn't much violence and if it weren't for the excessive swearing this would not be unsuitable for younger viewers. The acting is decent enough; Holly Mae Brood is solid in the lead role. Overall I'd say this is far from a must see but it passes the time well enough if you are nostalgic for the hacker films of the '90s.

These comments are based on watching the film in Dutch with English subtitles.

No pun intended - also numbers not taking over ... I think. But my impossible to follow train of thoughts aside, the movie is quite easy to follow. Actually so easy that some got bored (I see you and I totally understand) - this is not really a movie that will have many surprises for most viewers.

If you like thrillers though you may not care too much. European thrillers - now there are way better ones than this one. Still there are some interesting choices in story and characters development. Cliches are being thrown at us, but that is something to be expected. As is the ending and many other things here ... again, do suspend your disbelief and go with the flow ... if you can.

Combine the plots of the Net and Speed, locate them in modern day Rotterdam and replace originals with worse acting and direction and you'll end up with this movie.

This isn't the worst movie and I did manage to watch all the way through with some dozing off during the last inevitable action scene. To excuse my nodding I'd like to say that at this point the plot no longer makes any sense (if it ever did).

If you belong to the minority group of viewers you'll also notice that the cycling routes the main character makes are quite illogical.

The direction and editing are quite okay and the movie moves forward nicely. The acting is not cringeworthy all the time (at least to a foreign viewer) and there are some actually good scenes here and there.

Since it was a Dutch movie newly released on Netflix we were curious to see this movie. But it turned out to be disappointing. The storyline is straight out of fairytale and has nothing to do with reality and therefore makes it totally unbelievable. Acting is mediocre at best and there is a lot of running and saying "f#@k" all the time.

It makes the movie one dimensional and more like a (bad) cartoon.

Sadly this movie fits in a long row of Netflix productions we're quantity trumps quality.

To end with a positive note: the city of Rotterdam gets a great promotion with all its highlights, so if this movie inspires you with inspiration to vist this citty something good came out of this production.