Genre: Thriller
Runtime: 110 minutes
Year: 2009
Starring: Linda de Mol, Huub Stapel, Pierre Bokma, Daan Schuurmans, Ariane Schluter, Jaap Spijkers, Stefan de Walle, Koen de Bouw
Description: Maria (Linda de Mol) tries to escape a stalker by moving with her children to her sister’s isolated beach house.
Review: “Terug Naar de Kust” is a movie based on the novel written by the Dutch bestselling author Saskia Noort. She decided director Will Koopman would be the best choice to adapt it to the big screen, together with her husband Lex Wertwijn, who is a screenwriter and cameraman. And where the book has a lot of tension, the movie lacks it and somehow the story lost its edge too.
Maria Vos is the mother of two and has a relationship with the impetuous Geert, with whom she plays in a band. However, the relationship between the two is very tense and she ends it. When Maria discovers she is pregnant, she decides to have an abortion. Shortly afterwards she receives a number of bizarre anonymous messages, in which she is called a murderer and gets death threats. The police advise her to ‘disappear’ for a while, when they investigate the case. Maria leaves to stay with her older sister Ans, who owns a villa by the sea. There too, however, she finds no rest; she is confronted with traumatic childhood memories, and her mental health seems to deteriorate further and further.
Director Koopman has been given a considerable cast for her feature debut. Of course there is Linda de Mol, very loved in The Netherlands and a gifted actress. In addition, she managed to stand tall against Huub Stapel (with a relatively small role) who is probably one of the best actors in The Netherlands. And there is also Ariane Schluter, Pierre Bokman and Daan Schuurmans to accompany them. With such a great star cast, little can go wrong when it comes to acting. You might say. Nevertheless, Koopman hardly manages to let any of them come to full bloom. De Mol for example, acts way below her level and Stapel has little to work with to make an impact. Schuurmans does his best and is good, the relationship between his character Geert and Maria comes off as forced and is unbelievable.
The plot lacks tension, there a too long uninteresting segments and a climax that you could see coming from a mile away. The entire film is just not captivating enough. With such source material, which did have tension and was interesting and surprising, it’s really a mystery why this movie didn’t work.
Rating: 2 / 5
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