Gerard Thoolen Movies

The naked body of a murdered little girl is found in a forest surrounding a small Eastern European town. It's the third case in a row, and local police detective Victor Marek (Richard E. Grant) is on the killer's trail, but his superior, Novak (James Laurenson), needs to solve the crime quickly in order to boost his political career. So he arrests some suspicious hippie who later hangs himself in a prison cell. Though Marek is ordered to close the case, he continues to work on it on his own. He rents an old gas station and a house in the area where the murders took place. Working from a drawing done by one of the murdered girls he tries to find the clues for the identity of the killer. Marek becomes so obsessed with his quest that when he meets Milena (Lynsey Baxter), a single young woman with a little daughter (Perdita Weeks), he does not hesitate to use the child as the bait for the criminal. Though the film plot bears a strong resemblance to Sean Penn's movie The Pledge, it is actually a remake of the 1958 German film It Happened in Broad Daylight, scripted by Swiss writer Friedrich Dürrenmatt, who later reworked his original screenplay into the novel The Pledge. ~ Yuri German, Rovi

Whether it is the duck in the box she is carrying, or something else that's in there with it, Sacha (Loes Wouterson) is being followed by some very unsavory characters. She agreed to hold it as a favor to a stranger, and since then, she has been mugged, and has had to seek refuge with two pretty scary men (Victor Löw and Jack Wouterse) who keep casting greedy glances not at the box, but at her violin. She is a violinist, and was on her way to Amsterdam to tell her boyfriend that she is pregnant. Instead, as she hides from her pursuers with these two bums, she strikes up an unexpected romance. Along the way, her rescuers share with her what they think The Three Best Things in Life are. ~ Clarke Fountain, Rovi

Though it is hardly the reputation the Netherlands has around the world, this small nation has significant numbers of very dedicated religious believers, and many of them are to be found in small towns or on islands away from the big cities. In this story, one such group dominates life on an island off the coast from Rotterdam. In the story, a group of adolescents have grown up together in this wholesomely close-knit, if slightly repressed, community. They even remain friends after they discover the joys and terrors of sex. Each of them goes on to adult occupations. One becomes an accomplished musician, and another, the preacher's son, comes back to the island as an important reporter. While he is there a horrible murder takes place, and he becomes involved in the investigations that follow. ~ Clarke Fountain, Rovi

Personal issues centering around whether it is being loyal or duplicitous to admit or deny the multinational nature of one's origins dominate this slight drama. In the story, Anton has a German mother, the assistant to a Dutch stage magician. He was born in Germany during the Second World War but moved with his family to the Netherlands as a toddler. Work was hard to come by, and stage magicians were not in great demand, so times were hard. In fact, Anton's mother took him with her and returned to live with her mother in Germany. Sometime later, his father took him back to the Netherlands, on the pretext that it was just for a holiday visit, and insisted that he remain with him there, citing fears that his son would become a "Kraut." Anton grew up pretending to be all Dutch and later becomes involved in the television industry. He is married, with children. However, he has so deeply internalized his father's wish that he be 100% Dutch that it takes a visit back to Germany to see his mother for him to admit to his family that he is, in fact, half German. Ironically, a short time later, at a Netherlands vs. German team soccer match, he forgets himself sufficiently to join the crowd in jeering the German team. ~ Clarke Fountain, Rovi

Liesje has heard about her father all her life. The story her mother tells her is that she met and married in Rio de Janeiro, and left him to return to Amsterdam because she was homesick. He is supposed to rejoin them after he has made a lot of money from his crocodile hunting business. In the meantime, they have been staying at her grandfather's house. Grandpa is dead, and Liesje's mother has a boyfriend who is staying in his old room. Liesje is not happy about his, and quietly manages to sell off some old heirloom stamps to find her father and set things right. Instead, she discovers the truth, which is that he is just around the corner, and is serving time in prison for smuggling. This serious children's drama is based on a book by Burny Bos, and was released in some markets as Maman! dessine-moi un papa. ~ Clarke Fountain, Rovi

This social drama concerns the residents of an Amsterdam tenement apartment. The characters come from all walks of life and share a common bond in hopes for a better life. Included are a female student who lives with her brother, a single blonde mother with two dark-skinned daughters, and a shady trader who wheels and deals to make a modest income. ~ Dan Pavlides, Rovi

The full title of this Dutch film is Pervola: Tracks in the Snow. A stockbroker moves away from his home village of Pervola and puts his two sons in charge of his business. Older brother Hein (Bram van der Vlugt) cheats younger brother Simon (Gerard Thoolen) out of his share, claiming that Simon was disinherited because he is homosexual. Hein grows powerful, while Simon seems to weaken with each passing day. Flash-forward several years: the dying stockbroker calls his sons to his side. Faithful Simon agrees to dad's wishes that he be buried in Pervola, but Hein doesn't want to go to the trouble of transporting the body; he finally agrees to help Simon, out of fear that his brother will learn of his long-ago treachery. While arduously journeying to Pervola with the father's body strapped to a sled, Hein inadvertently confesses; Simon, however, is of strong enough moral fibre to forgive his brother. When they finally reach Pervola, it is Simon who is the more "powerful" of the two brothers. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Set in 1941 in Amsterdam, this is a story of humanity -- specifically, Otto (Gerard Thoolen) the Jewish owner of an ice-cream shop, his best friend Gustav (Bruno Ganz), and his friend Trudi (Renee Soutendijk) -- facing the dangers of an escalating war and the specter of fascism. The outgoing, fun-loving Otto came to Amsterdam from Berlin, and while his shop is a focus for anti-Nazi activists, Otto also cares about making good ice cream and supplying his customers with the best pastries he can manage. When his friend Gustav is on leave from the army for awhile, he spends some time with Otto and falls in love with Otto's friend Trudi. As conditions and the environment around them fluctuate and change, the three friends react differently. But it is certain that Otto's gatherings of anti-Nazi activists are not going to be unnoticed for long -- and whether he is fully aware of it or not, the prognosis is not good.
~ Eleanor Mannikka, Rovi

Loosely based on some political events in the 1960s, this film about the rise and fall of a Dutch public relations man is well-acted, but may be abstruse to outsiders not familiar with the allusions to real people and places (real names are not used). The story centers on Ben Mertens (Gerard Thoolen) who goes to a doctor for help with his alcohol problem. The physician prescribes very controlled doses of morphine to get him through the rough patches - which is fine until an unscrupulous doctor bribes Mertens with unlimited doses of morphine so Mertens can get him a top position in a government organization. Mertens complies, but while under the influence of alcohol and drugs, he talks too much to the press about who and what he knows. That mistake turns out to be unaccountably fatal, and Mertens' unexplained demise in a hospital remains a mystery. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, Rovi

As a social worker trying to cope with the emotional demands of his caseload, Hes (Gerard Thoolen) is usually as detached and aloof as possible, a frame of mind almost encouraged by the dullness of the bureaucratic life around him in the office. His attitude changes, however, when he encounters the case of a young girl kept locked in a closet by her parents until the time of their death -- and now the girl cannot handle the outside world. Hes needs all the patience, kindness, and strength he can muster to make some progress and break down her wild, asocial, animal-like behavior. He really wants to adopt the girl, but his wife is completely against that idea. Just when it seems there is some hope for bringing her to normalcy, the State approaches Hes with ideas of its own. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, Rovi

The in-for-treatment protagonist is middle-aged Helmert Woudenberg. Expecting a routine examination, Woudenberg is informed that he has inoperable cancer. He also learns that this news is meaningful only to him: the red-tape-bound Dutch hospital system couldn't care less about Woudenberg's anguish. Codirector Marja Kok appears on-camera in a showy supporting role. In for Treatment is a deliberately biased product from the Netherlands' Werkteater theatrical co-op. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi