Black Book (2006)

Before he "went Hollywood", Netherlands-born director Paul Verhoeven made some remarkable films, mainly starring the young Rutger Hauer.  After making something of a splash Stateside, his career there seems to have petered out, largely through some misguided projects -- although I personally find "Showgirls" a guilty pleasure and also think "Starship Troopers" is a hoot.  Anyhow, after 20 years, he is now back in Holland where he started and has directed this well-made World War II saga.  Carice van Houten plays a Jewish singer still in hiding in 1944.  When the farm where she has been holed up is bombed, she joins other fugitives, including her parents and brother whom she has not seen for years, on a barge headed for freedom only to see all of them slaughtered by a Nazi patrol.  Suspecting a set-up, she joins the resistance under new identity and a new appearance and agrees to become the mistress of a gestapo officer to help the cause.  The actual story with its ins and outs is far more complicated, as one would expect from a 135-minute movie, but it is all very competently presented and even suspenseful.  Van Houten, who is on-screen non-stop, is magnetic and the balance of the cast excellent.  The film is something of a throwback to the director's earlier works, in particular "Soldier of Orange" from 1977, although Verhoeven can't resist the occasional unnecessary vulgarities and gratuitous nudity that marked his Hollywood years.  Still the movie is a definite return to form, albeit occasionally potboiler-ish, but on balance certainly recommendable.