VividSimon Simply Perfect

Dynamixor The performances transcend the film's tropes, grounding it in characters that feel more complete than this subgenre often produces.

Bea Swanson This film is so real. It treats its characters with so much care and sensitivity.

Allison Davies The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

tdesai99 Verhoeven/Soetman's Spetters is a variation on Saturday Night Fever, a depiction of youth in their age, but unlike the latter film it accomplishes more by serving as a criticism of the entire society it depicts. This criticism (whether conscious or not) is most obvious in the story of Rien Hartman, who kills himself not because he is in a wheelchair per se but because he can no longer get it up, even when his girlfriend tries to give him a blowjob. His manliness and potence is so important to him in this smalltown macho culture that he does not feel human without an erect penis. Of course plenty of people are disabled and live decent lives, but many are able to release their frustration over what they had by finding an inner peace through meditation or something similar. Rien never even considers such a thing because his culture does not allow it. The only religious outlet he has is the occult version of "Christianity" that is depicted in the film, a kind of extroverted showy social religion with nothing to offer the inner soul of the individual except temporary escape. Rien refuses to accept even this, both due to his own internal weakness and also due to its social character, which he feels shamed by.Verhoeven depicts a world with only fake spirituality and no real values except for crusade and conquest. Sexual predation/conquest, financial opportunism, hypocritical preachers, reporters and businessmen are plentiful, but there is little give and take. People take action with limited vision, seeing only themselves and their own interests rather than a larger humanity or their place in it.In SNF, the girl is a pathetic hanger-on who is raped in the end by her own friends for fun, because to them she is worth nothing because she gives herself no worth. In Spetters, the girl is strong but opportunistic, and there is a scene where you see the complexity and guilt of her character underneath the facade. The sexual stuff is accomplished with the closeted homosexual character, who is brutally raped for sport, and then ironically becomes gay because of it. As in SNF, but in a more artistic and ironic way, the values are all skewed for these people. But in SNF, dancing provides a temporary outlet for this macho culture, and ultimately it seems that there is escape for the main character if he can just get out of his class. There is escape possible for the woman in Spetters too, yet it isn't clear that the escape will be better than the current reality, and the only one who really escapes is the predatory brother.In any case, as one of the better "social" films of the past 40 years, I give it 10 stars.

bbraat Let me insert a positive comment prior to my trashing one of the plots of the film: I thought it was great the way the filmmakers handled the nudity and sex. I wasn't shocked by it but rather I found it to be natural and expected when it was shown. often I find that movies that shy away from showing sex use its absence to titillate, for example, the well placed prop or hand that blocks the view of genitals. such practices only serve to draw MORE attention to those body parts. In this film, the casual nudity and sex only served to demystify themselves. It was no porno, the point of the film was not sex. Sex was merely one of the vehicles from point A to B. Good work. I'll have to raise my rating to commend the makers for the groundbreaking WAY they told the story. Many films have offensive plots that never make this much of an impact.Now to my complaint about one of the film's plots: A badly written movie that reminded me of "Valet Girls" and "Angel" ('High school honor student by day, Hollywood hooker by night' not the Buffy spin-off) without their humor. The writing was on level with the porn movies made at the time. (Yes, the porn writing at that time was in it's heyday but it was still bad writing.) To focus on one of the most egregious part of the plot: Even listening to the director's commentary didn't help explain the whole ridiculous and insulting gay-subplot. Ah, so getting gang-raped by a bunch of guys late one night will make you gay the next day. (i wonder if that would work with lesbians?) So maybe sexually repressed heterosexual women could be helped by gang-rape? Once they get banged they'll realize that they like it, will become sexually liberated, and will show up at the rapist's house the next day for some snuggling as Eef did. A component of good writing is that, even if the revelation about a character is surprising, a viewer should be able to go back in the film and realize that it was foreseeable. In this movie there is nothing that Eef did that showed him to be gay any more than were his friends or the viewers. 1. the measurement scene: it wasn't his idea, it's not uncommon, and if that means he's gay, then his two friends are even more gay. 2. The gay-bashing scene: even if it was his idea, his friends and their girlfriends were at least if not more brutal than he was. 3. Failing to get erect for his girlfriend: as he said he was drunk, I'm sure this has affected most of the film's viewers at one time or another, and from the dialog it seemed as if it had never been a problem before. In fact the other couple also had a problem that prevented them from having sex. 4. Watching the gay sex scene: yes, he watched it briefly but immediately his idea was not to relieve himself sexually. Instead his immediate idea was to use it to make money to win the favor of the girl. If watching three seconds of that scene makes him gay it makes everyone of the viewers who watched it gay as well. 5. Does a twenty year old really living in Rotterdam in the 80s need to be reminded that homosexuality is an option? There is porn of every variety on every newsstand in that country. Legalized prostitutes have delineated districts. If he wanted to have gay sex he probably would have by this point.

John Primavera This film is no "Saturday Night Fever." For one thing, "Spetters" is more of an art film; while the other reeks of commercialism throughout. The music by the Bee Gees, moreover, makes it look more like a record album vainly attempting to be a film. Second, sexual repression in SNF more impacts the lives of the American kids than it does the Dutch boys. The garage scene in the latter film (where the three young bikers compare erections to see who gets first crack at the carny gal)would be judged too homo-erotic for American audiences to take, for instance. While the American boys go disco dancing for fun; the dutch kids try testing their courage in more dangerous ways, such as bike racing. While the only death in "Spetters" occurs when a biker deliberately crashes into a moving truck (a suicide, rather than living his life as an impotent cripple); the American dies falling off a bridge while stunting! Even the role models for the two groups of young men are different. While John Travolta admires a poster of Al Pacino, an actor, on his bedroom wall and takes pride in his hairdo; the bikers' hero is a national cyclist whom they want to emulate and become someday. Defining manhood, in American terms, becomes just another marketing tool(since Travolta has no aspirations to act); while the three bikers know the way to manhood lies through courage, not false glamor and appearances.The scene where one of the bikers gets paid back for robbing and beating gay men by being gang-raped by tough-looking homosexuals, is excellent. Here the tables are turned in a way we would never see in American films, since gays are supposed to be victims who never fight back against their attackers. This demonstration of courage to defend one's honor and dignity makes "Spetters" a far superior film than SNF. SNF, despite all its trendiness as a barometer of the seventies, treats both its men and women as garden variety, working-class stereotypes. For genuine closeness, heroism and male-bonding, check this one out at the video store (make sure it's the uncut 123 min. DVD Director's version). A better coming-of-age film you will never see.

povergaag Spetters in dutch means roughly the plural form of splash.De spetters van water kwamen terecht op de tafel.The splash of water came directly on the table.It is also very similar to the English word splatter.Dutch and English are both germanic languages so there are many similarwords.This movie is unique in that it starred Rutger Hauer, Jeroen Krabbe and was directed by Paul Verhoeven, later of Basic Instinct fame and unfortunately also Show Girls. These actors and director have gone back and forth and have done work in Holland and also here in America. Jeroen Krabbe was in The Fugitive and Prince of Tides with Barbra Streisand.