m_palmer45 Aristides-2 and malcolmgw have already mentioned some of the holes in the plot that you can drive a truck through, such as Jack's leg being broken and rotting away one day but being magically healed when he clambers across a river along the underside of a bridge on the very next day.Aside from absurd details like this, the historical premise of the movie is unrealistic. The events portrayed are supposed to have happened in January 1945, at a time when the Germans were running from the Russians in the East and mobilized their last reserves of manpower, weaponry, and fuel for the futile Battle of the Bulge in the West. And yet this movie will have us believe that, just then, a whole company or so of German soldiers - all young men in their prime, well- fed, well-armed and -motorized, spic and span - are tasked with playing cat and mouse all day long with a bunch of hapless villagers in the Dutch countryside? And that, with 5 years of battlefield experience, none of them can hit a standing target at 50 paces?I get that the makers of movies are more interested in human virtues and morals than in historical facts, but it nevertheless detracts from a move when the historical background is so poorly treated.

Diego Silva Initially, we should consider that any serious psychological approach on WW2 is fated to slow and deep scenes. Those who watched this film expecting hollywoodian action certainly got frustrated. This, however, doesn't free the film from critics of people used to melodrama. Some reviewers have pointed the film's realism, while others have found some inaccuracies that essentially ruin this Dutch piece. I won't try to sound clever than anyone else by establishing a midterm; I'll just explore the opinions from my perspective, helping later spectators to identify what failed and what succeeded in "Oorlogswinter".1. Actors: the cast is fairly the film's stronghold. No one can put in doubt Martijn and Yorick's competence. Their performance is outstanding and mostly suitable. Their expressions dismiss dialogues, reveal situations in which the viewer can dive in and securely assume a position. Actually, we can live Michiel's reality, we can comprehend his actions, his fears, his words and thoughts. Let me exemplify (big spoiler ahead): you surely understood what was going through the protagonist's mind when he pointed, for the second time, a gun at his uncle. He was stuck between childish bonds and wartime manhood. And you also noticed Ben's confidence on his nephew's hesitation; you knew he would denounce Jack if Michiel spared him. The razor's scene is very symbolic too. Some criticize the British pilot, his age and actions; but we should remember he was perturbed as well. He was experiencing something new and uncertain, he probably had passed his last months doing missions in the sky or training in quarters. This helps to understand his affection for Erica, since she was the very first lady he talked to after a long time. The minor characters are decent, though not perfect. Michiel's mother showed a genuine reaction to her husband's arrest, but her anguish apparently disappeared when she stepped home. Theo's actions didn't seem natural, but I mainly blame his embarrassing "rotating toy" (that thing even managed to make Martijn look stupid in the last scene).2. Plot: "Oorlogswinter" has a good story; it may seem cliché at a first glance, but it explores a new perspective on late western front. The resistance cause, the betrayals and the crashed airplane create an interesting background to the Netherlandish daily life in mid 40's. However, the screenwriters were too careless to make that plot worthy of the actors. I noticed they got the protagonists in problems not knowing how to free them exactly. The actions scenes seemed nice initially, but the outcome was always implausible, incoherent. I remember very well the bikes scene, in which Jack and Michiel were cycling through a road when they faced German soldiers on sidecar motorcycles. The two stopped and ran to the trees; Michiel came back alone, took his bike again and calmly passed near the soldiers -who had just noticed him running! What to say about the carriage and the ferry scene then? Well, they don't deserve an elaborated comment. Jack's rodeo ability (and don't forget he was wounded), the unlikely chasers' collision with trees, the lengthy yet succeeded escape, Jack's incredible instinct, German's bad aiming, the unexplainable end of every chase scene, and the absence of any consequence after the encounter with the ferry controller (who saw Michiel and Jack's faces and, under pressure, probably denounced them, enabling a big search for the two young men) are just enough... And, of course, there is the bridge scene that unrealistically challenges the pilot's wound, and the unsuspected back and forth of a boy in a lonely forest. After all, we should admit one or other point that escaped from the screenwriters' insanity. The film managed to avoid the flat characterization of Nazis, as we noticed from two scenes in which Germans helped our protagonist. The Dutch rural movement and famine are well described. What can we conclude? This film has a realistic background and provides a convincing immersion. But crucial scenes are bad elaborated and reveal poor effort from producers. You may be missing details on space and costumes, but I don't have enough knowledge about these issues to touch them; while watching, I was just indifferent to the anachronistic houses some mentioned. This way, I give my final judgment: 6/10. And, after writing this review, I'm glad to realize I didn't lost my time watching this.

BreakawayDaily "Winter in Wartime" is not your typical "war" film full of guns, blood, and death. It is also not at all boring, like some war films sometimes can be. This one focuses on a boy who gracefully ages in front of our eyes in times of war, something I have never seen before in a war film. Very well done, moving story that you are highly involved in emotionally.Martijn Lakemeier and Jamie Campbell Bower both take your breath away on screen. This is a film no one talks about for Jamie, but it is definitely one of his best and most important pieces of work.You will find yourself yelling at your screen routing for the leads in this foreign masterpiece.Breakaway Daily www.breakawaydaily.com

jandesimpson What to do during a week of long evenings when my DVD player was on the blink? Fortunately a judicious bit of web surfing provided quite a rewarding answer - a channel offering free viewing of several hundred films. Many looked pretty dire so I whittled it down to the "World Cinema" genre. What rapture! De Sica's "Shoeshine", which I had not seen since I was a teenager, was there. For a second choice I thought I would try something completely unknown. I suppose it was the title "Winter in Wartime" that made this my next selection. It just sounded so evocative and atmospheric. As far as expectations of time and place were concerned the film certainly did not disappoint. The Netherlands under German occupation during the last winter of the second world war was deep in snow. We were viewing icy landscapes full of danger and unease through the eyes of a young teenage boy who was about to have his natural instincts of right and wrong severely tested by being in that place and time. Perhaps what I most liked about the film was that, is spite of being so realistic in its depiction of a particularly ugly period of history, it had those very elements of a good "Boys' Own" yarn that reminded me of stories I had not read for years - youngster and shot-down British airman playing a sort of scouts' "wide game" with the Nazis in frozen woodlands. Towards the end it became a real page turner. And then just when you thought you knew how it would all turn out, there was a real volte-face when a supposed goodie turned out to be the arch baddie of the piece. Never mind that the film often strained credulity, particularly when the airman with such a gammy leg performed acts of gymnastic dexterity. It was all such fun, except that it wasn't really. How could it when we had just witnessed an act of Nazi reprisal of such savage barbarity? Those old "Boys' Own" yarns were never as hard edged as this, making for a mixture of genres that instilled a real sense of unease.