First of all, in Holland there was much controversy around this movie. Crime-journalist Peter R. de Vries - author of the book "De Heineken Ontvoering" - did not sell the rights of his non-fictive story to director Maarten Treurniet and was criticizing that the movie was too fictional. Also criminal Willem Holleeder (Rem Hubrechts in the movie) who is currently serving a nine year sentence for extortion and involvement in the murder of a Yugoslav drugs-dealer filed a law suit against Maarten Treurniet for portraying him as a "maniac" in the movie. The law suit he evidently lost.

This served great as free promotion for the movie and the cinema was packed when I entered.

I must say, I was not disappointed at all. The acting is really good - except for Heineken's wife played by Truus te Selle who was not convincing and overacted at times. The two standouts were Rutger Hauer (Heineken) and Reinout Scholten van Aschat (Rem Humbrechts / Holleeder). They both delivered stunning performances and doing so carried the movie.

Not all positive though. Some scenes could have been much better, the "terror" caused by Humbrechts to Heineken was not well done.. Also it felt like it missed some scenes - the chauffeur of Heineken who was also held captive was hardly in the movie. And the way the police solved the kidnapping was not clear to me which is pretty crucial. Tracing down of the kidnappers felt a little bit rushed especially that of Jan Boelaard and Frans Meijer.

Said all that.. The movie was really fun to watch, especially the acting performances and the mixture of typical "Amsterdamish" humor with some good action. I'd recommend it to anyone (above 14 y/o orso) and it continues the positive trend of dutch quality movies.

I'd give it an overall rating of 7,2.

For a dutch film, this is a must see. The aging icon of dutch cinema, rutger hauer, gives another solid performance. This movie was pretty good n all, but still some things wrong with it, mostly the pacing... acting,scripting, suspense building, all top notch. The cinematography is good,and the music makes a good atmosphere. But from time to time i was still looking at my watch... scenes are drawn out too long and the interesting bits are unfortunately, infrequent. Overall a decent attempt with a good outcome of a film.

Enjoy -

The_evil_fred

Freddy Heineken was with his namesake company for almost 50 years, eventually becoming the president. He was the driving force behind Heineken becoming an international brand. He married Lucille Cummins, an American from a bourbon family. He was at the pinnacle of Dutch corporate life.

In 1983, six years before retirement, he and his chauffeur Ab Doderer were kidnapped and held for ransom by a gang of Amsterdam petty criminals: Cor van Hout, Willem Holleeder, Jan Boelaard, Frans Meijer and Martin Erkamps. They demanded and were paid a ransom of 35 million guilders. They successfully escaped to France, where they were eventually caught and extradited back to the Netherlands to do time. Some of the money was never found. Meijer escaped for a while to Paraguay, but he too was caught eventually.

Holleeder served his time and was released in 1992. (Hey, this is the Netherlands.) He emerged wealthy and well connected in the Dutch underworld and was later convicted of another famous crime. In the eyes of the Dutch media he has become notorious, the country's best known criminal.

Dutch director Maarten Treurniet has made a film about this very famous crime. However, like in most Dutch historical movies, telling a good story is paramount, so the film is deliberately not quite historically accurate. For example, Heineken's wife is portrayed as Dutch. Holleeder and others have complained about the inaccuracies in the film, Holleeder even litigating from prison to object at how he was portrayed and the inaccurate details. Holleeder has been renamed "Rem" in the film.

Even if the story wasn't totally accurate, it brought the whole affair to life for me. I thought it was a good film. The story, pace, acting, technical aspects all worked well. The melodrama you often see in Dutch movies was toned down.

The movie hinged on the personal relationship between Heineken and Holl..., er, Rem. Civilisation is a thin veneer. None of us, even the rich, are ever that far away from the Darwinian world of the schoolyard. The movie Heineken doesn't take kindly to being terrorised by Rem, but Rem understands the impact of physical violence. The movie unexpectedly humanised Holleeder for me, at one point trying to show that bad boy Rem himself was the victim of circumstances.

Rutger Hauer's performance was superb: he WAS Freddy Heineken. Reinout Scholten van Aschat (who really looks like the young Holleeder) brought the character to life. He projected both the physical magnetism and mean spirit of the narcissistic bully.

I enjoyed this movie for what it was. For me, it was one of the best Dutch movies in a while, and still is. I recommend this film.