Instant Favorite.

it is the rare 'crazy' movie that actually has something to say.

I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

When filming a book, one has the possibility to correct the flaws of the story to make it fit the two hours attention span that the audience needs to have. Reading a book for two weeks, immersing yourself in another world, is a different feeling than watching a story unfold in front of your eyes.Sadly no one bothered with this book to make it into a believable script. First of all there is a never ending list of invented names: kings, kingdoms, cities, knights, princes... After the first minute you don't know where you are, whom you're watching and even in which country you are. Confusion is created. That goes on with the next scene in which the aspiring knight Tiuri just has to sit quiet in a chapel for one night. Not an impossible task. But with the first knock on the door and a voice whispering for help, he opens it and has failed the test. No internal struggle, no struggle with the other aspiring knights, just plain stupid behaviour.And after this unbelievable act, there follow many. If the main character, which of course needs to be the one with whom the audience identifies itself, takes these kind of inexplicable decisions, he never gets any compassion. And he is not the only one with strange behaviour. The scoundrels who rob him, let him choose between a ring an a horse, and set him free after he has made his choice! Then there are the characterizations. No character gets any depth. No one is tormented by doubt. Every thought is said out loud. The "writer" helps Tiuri "because strange things are happening in the country". Even the red knight that decides not to kill Tiuri after he has saved him from falling of the cliff, tells him as if it is a material issue instead of a moral one: "Now I cannot kill you anymore." (-Why, is his sword stolen? -No, it's something moral but I'm not sure what it is.) The friendship that can evolve between characters who need each other is missed here completely. Tiuri and Piak, his, yes, what? Helper? He never helps him. His companion? They never share anything. They just ride next to one another through the endless woods.The letter in the end turns out to be nothing that couldn't have been told to the king via other ways. The way that the treason is stated by the king: "He wanted to murder him!" is plain painful. We are watching a movie for eight year olds! (And even they might be bored.) To cast not really beautiful people is not a crime, as long as they either can act well or have a devastating charisma. The role of Tiuri, a boy we have to watch almost the full two hours, is played by the not so handsome Yannick van de Velde and he neither can act very well nor has any charisma of sorts. He is like a spoilt, artistic kid from Amsterdam, complete with pretentious brawl. His hair is strangely yellow although the whole film the evil people are looking for a boy "with brown hair".The rest of the casting is made up of TV-actors, never taking the time to deliver the lines, being used to the "just say them"-regime. With a good script you can get away with that. With this crappy writing you can not. (Only exceptions are Jeroen Willems as the Lord of the Toll and the first Broeder Martijn.) To take this script, these actors and head for eastern Europe with all the medieval rental costumes of Holland ("voor al uw feesten en partijen"- no costume seems to be made especially for this movie) plus the ugliest wigs ever made borders on hubris. Let's hope this director, these producers get punished for that.

After hearing Tonke Dragt's "brief voor de koning" was about to be filmed I really was looking forward to it. "Kruistocht in spuikerbroek" showed a dutch filmmaker can do really well. So when I saw the trailer and read about it, I hasted myself towards the cinema, assuming this would be a great two hours movie.In the beginning all was fine, nice locations, beautiful costumes, all looked like it could be part of the book. But then, after ten minutes or so, the audio became very irritating with horrible lip syncing. It looked like afterwards in the audio recording studio the director forgot to show the movie and actors had to read their lines straight from paper … at once, without retries or any rehearsal. And why didn't any one bother to think about distance?? On film the actors turn their head, walk away, stand one meter from the camera or ten, but the volume is always the same.I guess I could get used to this, wasn't it for the horrible stage acting pronunciation. I mean, if an actor is on stage he should speak as clear as possible. But hey, this is cinema, the audio comes from several speakers, speak naturally, do not overdo it! Then there's the acting, how many shots did it take to make this movie, only one? Was half of all shooting days wasted on rehearsals? With every single scene I was under the impression the director shouted "Great, well done! Next one!" You can sometimes even see main characters without lines looking around like "what am I doing here, or hey, what kind of lens is that cameraman using?" And then the locations, though well chosen, did anyone really bother to recheck them before filming?? Why are electricity cables running on walls in a medieval setting? And was it so hard to cover up twenty century electricity boxes?? After this, I think it was twenty minutes into the movie, everything became very annoying. The night shots taken at day time with dark filters, but with the sunny shadows so clearly visible. The rare good acting of even fewer actors became bad, rapped by bad voice recording.And then, halfway through the movie I became angry, very angry, this was not a movie made to do just to the book or to entertain the audience. It was made so uninspired famous actors had a job and a film crew without any talent could make a full movie.Was it all bad then? No, the choice of many locations was great, even some actors really tried hard and costume design was great, but what remained was this horrible feeling I completely wasted my time, money and even worse, my good mood. So I left the cinema with an very angry feeling. This movie was an insult, a blasphemy of what good cinema is all about. Besides very few efforts it all looked like the makers wanted to make a very, very quick buck.But hey, this is my opinion. I still would say, go see for yourself. But please, rent it, or much better, try to lend it from friends or family or any one who was drunk enough to buy this one, because in all honesty, the idea the creators of this flick receive any more money makes me sick: they should be in the TV business, not the film industry.

As a very big fan of the book. Both books actually (Geheimen van het Wilde Woud is even better), I was disappointed. One of the reason I didn't like the movie very much is because it was made for children.You don't see any blood., it is too simple. The scenes are too short and the dialogs are not that appealing to me and convincing. Some of the characters are casted very well ( the Germans) but the dutch actors didn't do it for me. There isn't an interaction between the characters. They didn't pay attention to detail. And the movie was short.The movie and the scenes are way too short. Mainly because it is a movie for children. You know how much this ruined the movie for me? There should have been a more dark vibe around the movie. I missed that. And the fighting wasn't that good either. And the way the Red Knights are dressed and the way their shields were. It is not like in the books. And it can't be that hard to made? Almost all the reason I gave that disappointed me, were because it was a dutch movie and because it was a children's movie. That is what ruined it for me because I had high hopes.I know making a movie out of a book is hard, but it can be done and there are good examples like some of the guys here mentioned ( Crusade in Jeans).Too bad, hopefully the second part ( Geheimen van het Wilde Woud) will be better.

Mechanical translation from book to celluloid. No heart, no passion. An attempt to quickly earn as much money based on the popularity of the (audio)book. Wrong persons casted for the medieval roles. Love story of 2 scenes and 2 minutes. Friendship in 3 scenes and 3 minutes. Nevertheless - when the endless dragging thru the woods is finished - some beautiful castle pictures. Dark knights with white shields, grey knights with red shields: a film can do better than that. Director and producer should be a bit ashamed to have this film on his record. See "Kruistocht in spijkerbroek" for a much better NL book to film exercise.