Load of rubbish!!

Good movie but grossly overrated

Close shines in drama with strong language, adult themes.

It's easily one of the freshest, sharpest and most enjoyable films of this year.

b-film.nl From b to a > UPDATE: Splashes uncut is super. Real dick, real story. Splashes on to 2 (which may be some of Johan Nijenhuis).Brute commerce and an exploitation film without morality are cries that belong in the world of b-movie. B-movies (on this site, we use the broadest definition ..) are made ​​to throb, to shock and make money. In principle, not to lecture you. You have to love it. Paul Verhoeven, the Dutch star director after successes as Turkish Delight and Soldier of Orange. The cinemas were full and although reviewers always been critical opinions were never in the release of acid splashes.The film was dismissed as b-movie that the columns in the quality press hardly worth it. Or Verhoeven and writer Gerard Soeteman really outraged - so they played it - we can ask them next Tuesday. Then she attended the presentation of the polished and extra scenes provided version of splashes. The negative buzz made ​​time for a lot of curiosity and at hatching were again filled the halls.Whether that will happen with this reissue, remains to be seen. The 'commercial' and 'exploitation' are thirty years later and no less violent critic of the content will now worry. What is remarkable is that this new version is preserved by the prestigious Eye. Keepers of the Quality Film. What the film is still stripped of the title B-movie. There the authors undoubtedly chuckle about, and experts have splashes designated as a movie. For the lover there to "b-level 'is still much to enjoy. The title will remain welcome on this site.JdW b-film.nl

Verhoeven/Soetman's Spetters is a variation on Saturday Night Fever, a depiction of youth in their age, but unlike the latter film it accomplishes more by serving as a criticism of the entire society it depicts. This criticism (whether conscious or not) is most obvious in the story of Rien Hartman, who kills himself not because he is in a wheelchair per se but because he can no longer get it up, even when his girlfriend tries to give him a blowjob. His manliness and potence is so important to him in this smalltown macho culture that he does not feel human without an erect penis. Of course plenty of people are disabled and live decent lives, but many are able to release their frustration over what they had by finding an inner peace through meditation or something similar. Rien never even considers such a thing because his culture does not allow it. The only religious outlet he has is the occult version of "Christianity" that is depicted in the film, a kind of extroverted showy social religion with nothing to offer the inner soul of the individual except temporary escape. Rien refuses to accept even this, both due to his own internal weakness and also due to its social character, which he feels shamed by.Verhoeven depicts a world with only fake spirituality and no real values except for crusade and conquest. Sexual predation/conquest, financial opportunism, hypocritical preachers, reporters and businessmen are plentiful, but there is little give and take. People take action with limited vision, seeing only themselves and their own interests rather than a larger humanity or their place in it.In SNF, the girl is a pathetic hanger-on who is raped in the end by her own friends for fun, because to them she is worth nothing because she gives herself no worth. In Spetters, the girl is strong but opportunistic, and there is a scene where you see the complexity and guilt of her character underneath the facade. The sexual stuff is accomplished with the closeted homosexual character, who is brutally raped for sport, and then ironically becomes gay because of it. As in SNF, but in a more artistic and ironic way, the values are all skewed for these people. But in SNF, dancing provides a temporary outlet for this macho culture, and ultimately it seems that there is escape for the main character if he can just get out of his class. There is escape possible for the woman in Spetters too, yet it isn't clear that the escape will be better than the current reality, and the only one who really escapes is the predatory brother.In any case, as one of the better "social" films of the past 40 years, I give it 10 stars.

I don't know why I like this film so much...I think there are so much element of the film which are just so dumb and silly, but at the same time, this is just a film that keeps spooking around in you're head and makes you want to see this film for the second time, and for the third time, and for the fourth time, and so on... The story is, I hope, familiar with all you guys who are reading this review, so I skip that part. It's just the sort of story I really would like to see more in Dutch films, and not in the way Johan Nijenhuis does it. A story with real emotions, and where people turn out really different than you think they are for real. Eef here for example, the homophobic who turns out to be gay himself. You don't see that kind of stuff in 'Volle Maan'. The things I really don't like about this is, most of all, the really childish humor in this film, like at the gas station where Eef asks a girl 'Shall I put that in?' (Zal ik m er even insteken). Lame, but I guess that was just 'cool' in that time. But I think this film is excellent just because of the raw manner of filming, with in general not brilliant acting performances, but just very touching.

This film is no "Saturday Night Fever." For one thing, "Spetters" is more of an art film; while the other reeks of commercialism throughout. The music by the Bee Gees, moreover, makes it look more like a record album vainly attempting to be a film. Second, sexual repression in SNF more impacts the lives of the American kids than it does the Dutch boys. The garage scene in the latter film (where the three young bikers compare erections to see who gets first crack at the carny gal)would be judged too homo-erotic for American audiences to take, for instance. While the American boys go disco dancing for fun; the dutch kids try testing their courage in more dangerous ways, such as bike racing. While the only death in "Spetters" occurs when a biker deliberately crashes into a moving truck (a suicide, rather than living his life as an impotent cripple); the American dies falling off a bridge while stunting! Even the role models for the two groups of young men are different. While John Travolta admires a poster of Al Pacino, an actor, on his bedroom wall and takes pride in his hairdo; the bikers' hero is a national cyclist whom they want to emulate and become someday. Defining manhood, in American terms, becomes just another marketing tool(since Travolta has no aspirations to act); while the three bikers know the way to manhood lies through courage, not false glamor and appearances.The scene where one of the bikers gets paid back for robbing and beating gay men by being gang-raped by tough-looking homosexuals, is excellent. Here the tables are turned in a way we would never see in American films, since gays are supposed to be victims who never fight back against their attackers. This demonstration of courage to defend one's honor and dignity makes "Spetters" a far superior film than SNF. SNF, despite all its trendiness as a barometer of the seventies, treats both its men and women as garden variety, working-class stereotypes. For genuine closeness, heroism and male-bonding, check this one out at the video store (make sure it's the uncut 123 min. DVD Director's version). A better coming-of-age film you will never see.