The Silent Army

THE SILENT ARMY is a Dutch film looking at the plight of child soldiers fighting for warlords in sub-Saharan Africa. The film humanises the story by having as its central protagonist a white man desperately hunting for the kidnapped son of a friend who has been taken by a notorious general and who is now a ruthlessly cold-blooded killer.

The film I can best compare this with is JOHNNY MAD DOG, a Liberian effort which had greater authenticity and realism but hardly any kind of story. Thus THE SILENT ARMY is the better picture, even though the story is spoilt a little by the low budget; some of the moments are rather cheesy (such as a CGI explosion) which is a pity given the grittiness seen elsewhere in the story.

The language is a mixture of English and Dutch. The acting is generally authentic and compelling enough to keep you watching. The film is violent and harrowing without ever being disgustingly graphic. The actor who played the warlord made the film for me with his completely chilling and efficient performance devoid of emotion and feeling. It's a film worth watching if you can handle the subject matter.

Eduard Zuiderwijk (Marco Borsato) is a cook with his own restaurant somewhere in Uganda (my guess is Kampala). After the death of his wife Anna, he is now the single father of Thomas (Siebe Schoneveld). And fatherhood isn't easy for him, as he struggles to find time to take care of his son. However Thomas copes without his father presence thanks to his best friend Abu (Sam Okelo), the housemaids son.

That is until one days the Gods Army, a rebel group in Uganda led by the ruthless Michel Obeke (Abby Mukiibi Nkaaga), raids Abu's village and takes him prisoner. Not soon after Abu is slowly but surely being converted into a child soldier. Thomas however is unable to cope with another loss and dragged down by feelings of guilt Eduard decides to embark on a rescue mission.

As in most such Western movies the inherent weakness stems from placing a European context onto an African mindset and situation. Ripe with generalisations and troubled constantly by the inherent 'good intentionality' of the story the movie is a quagmire of bad scripting, simplified interactions and self-important gibberish. Coupled with some abysmally atrocious acting the question lingers: Why did I give it such a relatively high mark? Most of this has to do with the unrelenting realism of the situation of child soldiers and the very convincing portrayal of the process of molding youth in deadly weapons. Sam Okelo, Abby Mukiibi Nkaaga and some other black actors (notably Okelo's father) make most rebel scenes exceptional, heart-wrenching, believable and tragic. Especially the young Okelo does a stand-out job and really conveys the terror of conformity, which forces unwilling children to become that which they hate. Now if this movie had dealt almost entirely with the plight of Abu it would have been a memorable achievement. However...

Each and every time a white face appears in the picture the story-writing and dialogues take a head-dive into the badlands - unfortunately for the viewers this is about 70% of screen time. None of the white actors do even a mediocre acting job, while - I hate to say this about child actors - Thomas is absolutely atrocious. The less said about Marco Borsato the better - he should definitely stay with his day job. The direction of the movie feels like a hatchet job, so - despite some memorable and strong scenes - the movie is littered by several sequences, which invoke laughter and ridicule (not a good thing in a movie with such a sombre subject matter.

Essentially the movie feels as if writer/director Jean van de Welde took some real-life situations regarding child soldiers and struggled to paste together a plot around those ideas. Hence the realism of the rebel scenes work nicely, but the rest feels forcibly flung together, is poorly written and lacks similar intensity or significance.

The decent rating I give this movie concerns solely the rebel parts. Without them I wouldn't venture to grade it higher than a 1. Very surprising that Cannes let this artistic failure anywhere near their competition - not quite a turd, but very close to being one.

This is one of the most underestimated movies i have ever seen, people go to this movie prejudged as hell! No matter what Marco would have done they would all voted an 1 anyway, they don't recognize acting skills when they see it.. Marco Borsato did a good job in this movie, it was his first movie even!

This movie is really worth going to, a Must-see and everyone of these lame people who voted a 1 and saying that this movie failed, they fell in Marco Borsatos trap! Haha, Marco Borsato used his popularity to get people to go see this movie and FOCUS those people's attention on the whole of children soldier subject, and when you look at this movie you will get focused on that subject trust me!

So all the people who say this movie didn't work and went to it to watch it! The movie surely worked on them! They went there, not cause it would gonna be a great movie, not cause the subject attracts them BUT BECAUSE MARCO BORSATO PLAYED IN IT! they totally fell in the "attract-attention-from-people-trap" and Marco even made this a good movie, double win for Marco! 2-0

An evening to the movies turns out to be one of the greatest accomplishes in Dutch cinema.

Wit licht starring Marco Borsato is a great movie! From the first second you sit in your seat you are caught into the story line in which Marco Borsato goes on his journey to find a boy who has been taken by rebels. Although Marco Borsato is a singer from origin he delivers great screenplay and at the end of the movie he had the whole theater in tears.

Wit licht brings attention to the problems in Africa while bringing great entertainment to the movie theaters. 10/10!

Sorry, but in opposition to many of my predecessors I think this is quite a strong movie. The book might be a bit simple. (An heroic European cook saving a child out of an African rebel army. This is indeed not very believable. And the little side-love-story was not left out as well) But the picture has very strong emotional moments, is well edited and shot with opulent scenery and the acting is not as bad as many others put it. Just look at the rebels leader saying the cruelest things with the softest paternal voice you can think of. "You can call me daddy" - What a thrilling ambivalence lies in this scene. And the weirdest thing about all of it is that while watching the movie you know that those things are really happening like that down in Africa. (of course except the heroic part of the dutch cook - but the cruel part of it is unfortunately true) I have to say that I knew nothing of a Mister Borsato (Main Actor) before I watched this movie. Being from Germany I didn't even know him as a singer as all Dutch seem to do. And maybe that made my sight on his acting a bit more objective. At least I can say that I have seen many famous singers or pop-stars trying themselves out in being an actor with much less success then Marco Borsato did. only my 2 cents...