Please don't spend money on this.

I cannot think of one single thing that I would change about this film. The acting is incomparable, the directing deft, and the writing poignantly brilliant.

It's entirely possible that sending the audience out feeling lousy was intentional

The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

Fantastic film.Shows EXACTLY what boys of that age go through,the feelings of puberty.All boys feel some kind of feeling for someone of the same sex at that age,even if they are not prepared to admit it.This film dealt with this issue like it is.It showed how some boys never forget their first feeling of "love" and some move on.The boy in the film never forgot his and lived with it all his life.It is an outrage that Walt,the object of the young boys feelings in the film,was seen as some kind of "peado".He never encouraged the relationship as the boy,Jerome, later admits in the book he wrote many years later on which the film is based.This film had all the right emotions for that time.1945.The soldier away from home in a strange land meeting the boy going through puberty.A lovely,lovely film and very well acted and directed.

I had seen this movie about 10 years ago, and it didn't make that much of an impression, despite its subject matter. But I thought it might be ripe for re-viewing, so I watched it again last night. And it still didn't make much of an impression.Jeroen Krabbé (best known in the U.S. as the villain from The Fugitive) plays a choreographer who is overseeing rehearsals of a work of his, about "freedom." He gives his dancers vague directions that they can't really follow, and shows them videotapes of the Netherlands' liberation from the Nazis, and his dancers obviously just want him to shut up. So he returns to the Netherlands to recharge his creativity, and the majority of the movie is his flashback to his childhood.12-year-old Jeroen (also the character's name in the movie) is shipped off from Amsterdam to the Netherlands in order to escape the Nazis. He arrives at the house of this Dutch family (who really do wear wooden shoes), led by the hhhhhhhhhhhandsome Hait, who very unobtrusively makes Jeroen welcome in his home.So there's some adolescent shenanigans, then the liberation happens and some Canadian soldiers come into town to stay for a bit. One of them, Walt, takes an immediate shine to Jeroen, and pursues him pretty relentlessly. Their friendship grows, and I don't know, maybe I'm just way too outwardly gay, but the stepfather was warning Jeroen that "we don't do that sort of thing here" before it even seemed to me like anything had HAPPENED. But soon enough they are tastefully romping in bed together, and laying quietly together as Jeroen protests at being called a baby. "No," says Walt, "I just meant that you're my baby." Anyway, it goes on, and once it's over, we see that the adult Jeroen has somehow used his perusing of these memories to improve his choreography and the attitude of his dancers—though their work still looks really banal to me.I just didn't feel it. As a homo with a big-time Daddy complex, I expected to be much more moved, or even involved, in the story. But the whole thing stayed at a distance. I never felt the love that developed between the characters, or the admiration or awe that Jeroen had for Walt—as I said, it looked to me like they were just good friends, when the people in the film knew exactly what was going on. I suspect this happened because the filmmakers were so worried about keeping the whole thing tasteful—which they do—that the deeper emotions that might have stirred up more troubling moral issues were flattened out. On the other hand, they do succeed in portraying Walt as somewhat predatory without making him a monster or creepy molester, and at portraying Jeroen's budding homosexuality, as well as his lack of comprehension of what's really going on between him and Walt.-- Hey, check out Cinema de Merde, my website devoted to bad and cheesy movies (with a big subsection on gay films). You can get the url from my email address above...

I have to admit that I haven't read the book and after reading comments about it – I am not sure that I will read it at all. The movie however is superb. I have watched it several times by now – with friends of mine and alone. The main character is a young Dutch boy - Jeroen, played by Maarten Smit . He falls in love with Canadian soldier during the time he spends away from Amsterdam in a small village. He is send there by his mother, in order to avoid the starvation in the big Dutch cities during the world war when the food there was never enough.While watching this movie – you will have to decide for yourself if the relationship presented in the movie is acceptable to you or not. The theme song stuck in my mind – as well as and one of my favorite scenes in which Jeroen and Walt run in the field in a very unique way. To me this movie is mainly about friendship, then love – the relationship with Walt made the boy happy, just look the way he smiles when they have their picture taken in one of the scenes. At the same time the ending leaves some questions unanswered- both to the boys and to me as a viewer – was the Canadian soldier just taking an advantage of the boy? And if that is the case I will be disgusted from him. But what if he really loved – but then why he left him? As the movie focuses on the memories of Jeroen , we see that even as an adult he hasn't forget his hero- so there was love and one can only hope this feeling was shared by both main characters.

The many favorable reviews hailing this film as a cinematic delight are well taken. The delicate subject matter of a brief romantic relationship between an allied WWII soldier and a young boy in the occupied Nehterlands received a beautiful treatment. Without becoming lurid or vulgar, it is implied that the innocent "child" and the young soldier engaged in a sex act.Many layers of sub-plots surround the story. The people in the village setting appear deeply religious, constantly learning how to be proper followers of Scriptural guidance. Sermons given to the locals, amidst the visiting soldiers are both thankful for the liberators' arrival, yet warning the "young women" not to be tempting these men to be lead astray. It was a subtle switch from preaching in Englsih, to the native Dutch that showed who the audience for that particular part of the sermon was.There are many references to sexual tensions. The teenage boys suddenly notice the physical beauty in teenage girls. Without doubt, there was plenty of "fraternizing" between soldiers and local women. The scene where the young main character is out "exploring" with a slightly older boy is charged with sexual innuendo. The boy's "step father" is quite observant about the "goings on", yet offers no direct objections, only indirect and vague advice.The question of whether a mere child can give consent to sexual activity with an adult remains. The picture of the soldiers who came to liberate the town is one of men who felt entitlement. They felt they had every right to "have fun" after saving the people from their evil oppressors. Although the young girls, and even our 12 year old main character, were willing participants in any "affairs", the sense that the soldiers felt entitled to receive whatever they desired in exchange for their desperately needed Military help, and the many hand-outs of Life-Savers, Gum, Cigarettes etc. changes nothing about their feeling of power over the situation.For a grown man, a love affair of a few days can hardly be considered "love", but for a child whose innocence is forever lost, this is an affair they will never forget. Love is something not to be trifled with. A child's innocence should be regarded with no less respect. Whatever the "feelings" of the heart may have been, a 12 year old does well to give it a bit more time before seeking that first love.