Hammerhart - Too Fat Too Furious

I went to see Vet hard (or as it is called in Belgium 'volle gas' ) with expectations that weren't too high. My experience with former dutch attempts at action movies, especially the ones as far back as the 'flodder' movies and other dick maas attempts like 'amsterdamned', were not too good. And the trailer of vet hard did not promise any improvement.

What a sigh of relief I could breathe when I watched the movie! The story is erratic and makes no sense at times, but the movie does not aspire or pretend to be a feat of high story telling ability. Instead it focuses on it's best assets; fun action sequences which are exhilarating at times, despite the limited budget, and slapstick-like humor provided by a fantastic Jack Wouterse in the role of 'Bennie' and Peter van den Begin as 'Vuk'.

The acting overall ranges from adequate to excellent, the best being provided by Kurt Rogiers who portrays a necrophiliac serial-rapist in a way that he is almost likable. Jack Wouterse plays a convincing and extremely funny overweight Bennie and carries the role of the main character well. I wasn't too exited by the acting of Bracha van Doesburgh however, who looks great, but, as a fist timer tries her best to portray her character as believable as possible but fails in doing so at times.

All in all Vet Hard has it's weak points, a lot of them actually, but it is easy to forgive them. The movie was made with love and care and it is clearly visible the cast had a lot of fun making it.

An 8 out of 10

This is , for me, the best comedy ever from Holland!! Its really funny and strongly entertaining, you will not believe what you see sometimes... Our neighbors gave us many many hours of good movies, i also like "Amsterdamed" or "Flodder" but this is very Good. Its for a bunch of people sitting around your TV and drinking beer or something like that... I don't know this original Film "old men in new cars" so...don't think twice if you can catch this movie in a videostore!!!! I hope to see many more films from this young dutch guy. Maybe Hollywood need some more dutch people like Verhoeven or DE Bont?? Great actors, great camera and very very unique characters what do you want more?

I quit the movie after 36 minutes so one might think it is unfair to judge. Its just that by that time the Dutch team got so far behind the Danish original ("old men in new cars") there was no chance to make up the deficit. I did not know that I'm going to see a remake from the beginning so I just felt a little uncomfortable when Vuk was introduced. But soon they made clear whom they are going to challenge. From now on I couldn't help but to compare with the original. All of a sudden the actors appeared to be amateurish impostors. You might have experienced the situation someone's telling a joke that is not only well known but also badly presented. What a shame. Such a disgraceful defeat should not be published.

My God, what a rip-off! Dutch comedy at its lowest level, with your fair share of unfunny slapstick, simplistic misogynism and very stupid jokes. Even Luc Besson has not ever sunk to this level...

Can you blame the actors? Well, no second-rate soap actor would of course refuse a part in such a blockbuster, but I must say that I was disappointed by the fact that Jack Wouterse (who was magnificent in Temmink) accepted his part. Is it so hard to get a decent role these days? Or did he just misread the script?

The only reason why I give this movie 2/10 instead of 1/10 is the aircraft scene, which was quite spectacular. So just watch the aircraft scene and move on to some thing else.

Vet Hard, the debut of the 25 year old director Tim Oliehoek, is a definite thrill. Throughout the entire movie, you will be bombarded with nasty, but pretty effective jokes, loads of one liners and all sorts of other fun n weird stuff.

The characters are also pretty wacky, ranging from a fat woman hating tough guy, to a necrophiliac serial killer. Even though we do not really get involved with these characters, its hardly an annoyance, as the movie is pretty much focused on the action scenes. These scenes have been done very well, especially for a dutch movie, some might even say that a certain chase in this movie, has the same sort of excitement level, as amsterdamned once had with the speedboat chase. Again, even though there is a lot more heavier stuff coming from Hollywood, for dutch standards, its pretty wild.

The story isn't very original as well, yet its brought with such enthusiasm and you can see that the actors all had a great time. The little cameos of a lot of dutch celebs is fun as well, and are guaranteed some laughs.

I definitely recommend this film, as it is one of the better dutch comedies and features some great and hilarious (action) scenes.

Regarding the director Tim Oliehoek, i think we will be seeing a lot more from this guy!