antal-wahlers Intense movie with a plot that seems inevitable. "Van God Los" (which literally means "detached from God/to secede from God" and not "Godforsaken") is loosely based on the infamous "Bende van Venlo" (Venlo Gang) whose mostly youthful members allegedly committed over 250 crimes in 1993 and 1994.The cold-bloodiness of the murders is acted out very well. It's hard to understand how a 15-year-old privileged dentist's son from the rural Netherlands can commit such crimes. The movie gives a very uncomfortable answer: That there is nothing to understand, that these things just happen because our society is the way it is.In my opinion, the original title speaks volumes about the tone the movie sets and the answers it tries to give. Whereas "Godforsaken" implies that God "left" us alone, perhaps in disappointment, "to secede from God" means deliberately leaving him behind. Unfortunately, I have no information on the writer's intention here. It befits the film to have to think for yourself about what it means to you. The film will definitely get you thinking for a long while after the credits are over.

Diand Van God los / Godforsaken! is about the gang of Venlo. They committed a series of murders between carnival (hence the carnival scenes and the costumes) 1993 and 1994, were subsequently caught and sentenced to prison. The murders shocked because they were committed by people with little motive and committed against random targets. And because violence on this scale is known here mostly from large (foreign) drug gangs where the financial stakes to obtain a cartel are high (several gang-related murders in Amsterdam alone last year).The real and complete story was a lot more complex and involved more people and more killings but is reduced here to the two main people convicted and a girlfriend they both loved. One (Maikel; Tygo Gernandt) has a deprived background but is very talkative and convincing; the other (Stan; Egbert Jan Weeber) more silent and from the upper echelons of society.You make a documentary and get as many facts right and tell the whole story, or you make drama and reduce the story to its bare essentials and fantasize and invent everything else. Here they choose the latter, but can't do away with the documentary style. But you can't have it both ways and that's why this fails somewhat. So we end up with a strange mix where the love relation is probably not that accurate but the details of the killings are.The difficulty is then to get some drama out of a series of random and senseless murders. There's some catharsis at the end, but overall this movie is too bleak and offers no redemption. There are no characters to identify with so the only shock comes from the murders that are brought with well-built tension here. (For a movie without these problems I refer to Boys don't cry).Intensity does not equal good acting. The whole cast is performing above average, not just the intense Tygo Gernandt. A big mistake is the voice-over, because it neither has the dramatic intensity to impress and the movie gets stuck a bit by not letting that go somewhere along the way. In the story I found it strange to see the character of Sef disappearing and re-entering at random.With its Gothic and catholic themes and classical music the movie has a sufficient overall art direction and design. Also the depressing town of Venlo is well projected. The movie sometimes looks too grainy and amateuristic technically.Overall direction is not strong. This is not A Clockwork Orange, but some parts are interesting: for example the part where the Turkish gang is presented in the Godfather-way (in fact the godfather never looks the two Dutch gang members in their face and refuses to speak their language).This movie is hailed as one of the best ever made in the Netherlands where in fact it is an average, but somewhat interesting movie. As about dramatizing actual events, wouldn't it be a good idea to pick up on the Van Gogh-murder.

Didier (Didier-Becu) "Van God Los" (free from God) tells the story about a gang from three Dutch boys (and a girl) who are terrorizing their neighbourhood with the cruel murders and in some way it can be seen as a Dutch version from Trainspotting. The acting is rather good and it's definitely one of the best dutch movies since ages and of course it is all quite shocking (especially when one of the gangmembers let his young brother from eight kill a man to let him feel the vibes). Still this movie has some minor points like the language (it's done in some dialect that is rather ununderstandable for non-native speakers) and God (aha) only might know why they casted Angela Schijf for this, but all by all an enjoyable movie that gives hope for cineast who do it independently.

weste117 Its a good movie bout 2 mates that are by coincidence hitman for the Turkish maffia, Good performances by all actors. This movie makes a shocking impression, by the use of cassual violence and characters based on the real events in a city in The Netherlands called 'Venlo'. A lively movie with a touch of reality.