Dard Divorce (2007)

How sad is this?

I like movies that are aware of what they are selling... without [any] greater aspirations than to make people laugh and that's it.

One of the most extraordinary films you will see this year. Take that as you want.

It is a whirlwind of delight --- attractive actors, stunning couture, spectacular sets and outrageous parties. It's a feast for the eyes. But what really makes this dramedy work is the acting.

This is the first time I have ever written a review on IMDb. The utter shambles that was Dard Divorce compelled me to do it. OK, firstly, the main 'actress' was perhaps the worst i've ever seen - can barely speak English, every word delivered in monotone and with absolutely no breadth of expression. They'd have done a better job with a sex-doll. In fact, pretty much every 'actor' and 'actress' were beyond bad, as though they'd all been drugged, or just picked up off the street. I can't really remember a single piece of dialogue that didn't sound stilted or contrived. As for the storyline, there really wasn't much of one - some drunk/lawyer girl (supposedly the director's wife) is going through a messy divorce. Her husband takes the kids away for a weekend, then stumbles in later and supposedly dies in front of her - cue numerous unnecessary gangster/bad guy characters who were completely unbelievable and torture scenes (which really weren't even that shocking)that were poorly filmed and dragged on way too long. I like gore but this was just bad, like something me and my friends might make. Even the unnecessarily long scene with the naked guy chopping up a body in the bath just didn't sit right. I'll not bother explaining what Dard means as it's just a complete non- event - it might as well have been called cabbage divorce or chair divorce for all it mattered. Worst of all was the sound. Not only were the songs the cheesiest shite I've ever heard, but the sound editor must've been on PCP. I've honestly never witnessed such bad sound mixing, particularly in the last scene, where the husband is explaining the plot for the whole film, and all we can see are his lips move whilst listening to some shoddy low-grade European electronica. The one redeeming feature of this movie was that the shots of the golden gate bridge made me think of Tommy Wiseau's The Room. In short - this was atrocious, avoid at all costs. It'll be 87 minutes of your life you'll never get back.

For starters this movie to me, seemed like it was shot by a twelve year old. The actors (if you can call them actors) were very ameturist, illogical and entirely unbelievable. The story dragged on, it was strange and a lot of the parts should have really been cut.However... I think on some level, the director's idea was idealistic and original, he could have done this film brilliantly if he had a well prepared and experienced cast. Now for what I actually saw the movie for, the gore... It was terrific, I was disgusted by every minute of it. Blood, limbs and protruding intestines, brilliant!

In Dard Divorce, Olaf Ittenbach's stab at 'torture porn', the director once again casts his pretty wife Martina in the lead role, despite the fact that she isn't a particularly good actress and her thick German accent often makes her difficult to understand. Not that his nepotism matters too much: she isn't the real star of the film anyway—the gore is! And with more graphic nastiness than all of the Hostels and Saws put together, this is one film that gore-hounds should find entertaining irrespective of how awful the acting is.Martina plays Nathalie Stein, an alcoholic mother in the middle of divorce proceedings whose husband suddenly goes missing, along with both of her kids, and a couple of briefcases full of cash and cocaine that belong to some very sadistic and unforgiving gangsters. Believing that Nathalie knows more about her husband's whereabouts than she is letting on, the bad guys proceed to torture her in a variety of nasty ways...Of the five Ittenbach movies that I have seen thus far (the other four being Chain Reaction, Premutos, Beyond the Limits, and The Burning Moon), Dard Divorce is easily the most gruesome. It takes a good twenty minutes or so for the bloodletting to begin, but hang on in there and you'll be treated to some of the most repugnant scenes of violence that I have ever seen. The brutality starts with Nathalie being repeatedly punched in the face, and gradually escalates in ferocity and explicitness. By the time the credits roll, viewers will have witnessed numerous gory stabbings and shootings, a child being sawn in half, eyeball removal, crushed heads, disembowellments, hammer attacks, and much, much more revolting stuff than this addled brain of mine can recall at the moment.No matter how hard I try to forget, however, one scene refuses to budge from my memory: the truly horrific moment when one of the bad guys gets buck nekkid in order to dismember a corpse in a bath-tub. As if seeing a dead body being mutilated in unflinching detail wasn't stomach churning enough, we have to put up with frequent shots of the sicko's butt and tallywhacker in the process. Yuck! With this movie, Olaf Ittenbach has once again proved beyond doubt that he know what he's doing when it comes to creating impressive gore set-pieces, but that he needs to polish up his writing and direction skills. Oh, and as others have noted, he should also hire someone who knows how to mix sound.I wouldn't particularly recommend Dard Divorce to your casual horror fan—technically the film is quite poor— but those who love their splatter should have a whale of a time.6.5 out of 10, rounded up to 7 for IMDb.

Having enjoyed Premutos for it's ridiculous gore and laugh out loud dubbing, I was pretty psyched to see another film by Ittenbach. So when Dard Divorce came strolling around, I immediately jumped at the chance. And what I got was that it sucked and was pretty good, all at the same damn time.The story is about this alcoholic lawyer chick who is in the middle of some money scheme. Mix in some nice brutality, some mediocre acting, writing and direction, and you have Dard Divorce. Besides the scenes of violence, the majority of the film is pretty weak.The lead character, the mother/lawyer/chick is awful at acting. She may even be Olaf's (the director) wife. Well, they're related in some way, since her last name is actually Ittenbach. Nevertheless, she sucked, almost to an extreme where "it's so bad, it's good." Maybe with a few beers in me I would have enjoyed her crap acting for kicks. Her German accent was sooo incredibly thick, but it wasn't her inability to say the words, but her whole delivery. She just couldn't act, it's that simple.Speaking of Ittenbach, I'm surprised he still hasn't come very far as a film-maker. He's made a good amount of films. Even though he's a pretty seasoned director, this film still felt amateurish on a few levels. Maybe budget restraints and such have an affect.....whatever. At least he brought home the effects and violence. He's always good for that it seems.Dard (Pain) Divorce isn't all bad, it has some pretty brutal scenes of torture which were pretty damn entertaining. The excessive punches to the face scene was the favorite for this guy. But with a forgettable story, awful acting by the lead and a truly cheesy ending, this movie is really just a passable film. Though if you do find bad acting funny and enjoy some brutal violence...and are a fan of Ittenbach, then by all means, enjoy Dard Divorce.