Landscape No.2

I recently saw this at the 2010 Palm Springs International Film Festival. Co-produced with Serbia this film is Slovenia's official submission to the Academy Awards for Best Foreign Language Film. From writer/director Vinko Moderndorfer this is a story about two men, one older in Polde (Janez Hocevar) and one younger in Sergej (Marko Mandic) who moonlight as burglars. They target the home of a wealthy former communist general (Janez Skof) to steal a valuable painting called "Landscape no.2" that had in itself been stolen from the national museum and spent the last 50 years in the generals possession. Polde's plan is to ransom the painting back to the general for $10,000. In the burglary, Sergej comes across a wall safe and steals the cash it contains as well as a some documents that he doesn't realize implicate highly placed persons in the post-war executions of Nazi collaborators. The general enlists one of his loyalists, a sinister former secret service exterminator known as Instructor (Slobodan Custic) to track down the stolen documents and eliminate the thieves. With Barbara Cerar as Sergej's fiancé Magda, Maja Martina Merljak as Sergej's sex pal Jasna and Jaka Lah as Sergej's apartment neighbor Damjan. This could have been a good thriller and Moderndorfer is obviously a talented filmmaker but the sex and violence are so over the top that it becomes ridiculous. I would give it a 6.5 out of 10.