joe-k-3 Great film, yes, humorous and clever. I spent a few months in Holland and saw the great contrasts between liberal Amsterdam and the almost Aamish conservatism of the countryside and its small villages. This film is an indictment of the religious puritanism and hypocrisy of the ' blind' , represented by the manic huntsman. It's rare to wish to see another human being blinded but here it feels like a much-awaited catharsis and it says something great about a Director who can make such extreme violence part of what the viewer himself feels is justified. Unlike Von Trier, who's violence disgusts and seems arbitrary and just stemming from his own mental illness, this Director here is fully in control of himself and his vision ( basically humane). For me the most irritating person is not the butcher, because while he is meant to seem animalist and piggish, his 'frustration' can be understood and is human. I don't really understand what his wife is meant to represent, and the prayer scenes outside their house, except to show religious extremism as hypocritical, inhuman and destructive of healthy love. It seems that only the boy, the dead girl, the black boy and the postmen are the only human beings worthy of that name in the village.Bleak, funny yes, but very dark. Ultimately , DEPRESSING. Doesn't make me want to live in Holland. In fact, this seems like a film made by a Director very unhappy with the State of his own country, and very alienated. It is the humour of desperation and the end of the film is messy and offers no hope. The postman returns, meets the boy , and so what? What then? Back to a "happy life" in that village from Hell?In the Dutch Dogville?I don't think so.

qtaran111 This is a great little film, by turns funny, surreal, with a couple of scary moments (especially with the vulture on the bed, the crazy bird from the shoulder of the monk statue, and after the hunter is blinded, searching the forest).Parts are reminiscent of Delicatessen (rebellious postman, mad butcher) and others are straight out of a grimm fairy tale (the scenes in the woods), however it is always engaging and well-acted. Although I think Dutch people will get more from the socio-historic context of the story, I think everyone can identify with the mixed-up lives of "ordinary people" in small, soulless towns. Weird!

Didier (Didier-Becu) Go back to Holland in the suxties at where we are in a small part of some village and where we follow the lives of some inhabitants. They are all normal people with very strange behaviours...a postman who opens and reads the letters he has to deliver, a butcher who is longing for sex that can't be given by his overcatholic wife (and their son who is only interested in the politics from Belgian Congo), a woodwatcher who thinks he can make the world a better place to watch the woods in a machoway but fails to please his woman in bed, a schoolteacher who seems to be bored by everything he does...and little by little we see that all these lives are related whether they want it or not, they all wanna go their own way but are stopped by the ruling hiphophrisy from the streets they're living in. "De Noorderlingen" is a quite interesting movie that has great moments but sometimes looses itself into surrealism in a Bunuelway that spoils a bit the movie (the son who thinks he's a prime minister from Congo for instance) but all by all I liked this black comedy. Belgian viewers will be longing to see a very beautiful (and young) Veerle Dobbelaere starring here!

rjdeklein don't try to understand this movie if you haven't lived in holland for a considerable time, this movie portrays in a very ironical way, the narrowminded attitude of the dutch people in the 60's. it is sharp and down to earth at the same time. i don't think non-dutchman will appreciate this movie, but you can always try! i am from holland and i thought it was a brillant satire, with good perfomances of a few well known dutch actors (including the director who also plays the role of the postman).i give it an 8 out of 10.