The Silent Army (2008)

How sad is this?

Did you people see the same film I saw?

if their story seems completely bonkers, almost like a feverish work of fiction, you ain't heard nothing yet.

It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

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.

It's nice filmed, big budget, but rather spend it on poor people because, this movie was bad as hell. The leading role is approved to Marco Borsato, which is a good singer really, but he just can't act. If this was an American movie with a better plot it would have been a big hit. There are many reasons why this movie could have been better. But really, its just awful. You could watch it with a friend on DVD on a boring night, but i suggest rather to make a pizza or go to a bar.So whenever you are planning to go to this movie, i can just say, don't go! Dutch movies can be great. For example Zwartbook with Carice van Houten, who plays in the Valkyrie movie. This director can better find another job. For now, 1 star is already to many for this movie.

First of all; the behavior of Marco Borsato is very rookies and secondly you can save time when you watch a Warchild ad, because this movie is just one huge Warchild advert.All the effort of showing the Warchild (a NGO) case is really annoying and this is a bad ego trip of Marco Borsato Borsato is the only hero of the movie and the Africans all seem to be war victims or war criminals and nothing else. If a naive cook from Europe becomes a action "hero" in the way that it has being filmed it looks like a nice piece of imperialism.The subject of child soldiers has already been told and filmed hundreds of times and this movie is not a good way to show the problem, because its just a personal ego trip of those who made it.