The VanishingSaskia Wagter (Johanna ter Steege) and Rex Hofman (Gene Bervoets) are a young couple in love from the Netherlands taking a road trip to France. After they visit a rest stop off of the highway to recuperate from the drive, Saskia goes missing without any trace--Rex frantically searches for his girlfriend, but to no avail. After three years of what becomes a tale of Rex's obsessive search to discover what happened to Saskia, we also get the perspective of Raymond Lemorne (Bernard-Pierre Donnadieu), a superficially benign husband and father of two girls who seems to be rehearsing the act of abducting a woman. In time, the two mens' lives intersect, and the revelation of Saskia's vanishing becomes one of cinema's most chilling climaxes.
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The Vanishing was adapted by director George Sluizer from a story by Tim Krabbé, known as "The Golden Egg"; the metaphor of a "golden egg" is revisited throughout the movie, and is first brought up by Saskia as she recounts a dream to Rex in their car. In the dream, Saskia tells Rex that she is inside a golden egg in space. And while this part of the dream has reoccurred for her before, the newest addition to it is that she envisions Rex in another egg like hers, and that they will meet again in space. Like any dream, it is strange, but it also signifies a kind of separation and loneliness that underlies the film that can only be overcome by the two of them reuniting. "Reuniting"? Even this early, there is the subtle implication that they will be separated, which we experience even moments later when their car runs out of gas, and Rex storms off with a jerry can, leaving Saskia frightened and alone--definitely a jerk move, which Rex later acknowledges and apologizes for, swearing to Saskia that he will never abandon her again. It's very clear that the two of them are in love, and they might have been true soulmates. But circumstances being what they are, she is taken from him, and he is emotionally crippled by the event. After a constant crusade to learn what happened to her, torturing himself and (by his obsession over Saskia) his new girlfriend, Lieneke (Gwen Eckhaus), he has built an unassailable image of Saskia in his mind, unable to forego his consuming desire to know what happened to her, willing to forego his own well-being in his dogged pursuit of the truth--that very weakness is just the kind of irresistible temptation for a megalomaniacal predator like Raymond.
Raymond is a self-avowed sociopath, who claims to have a nigh-indistinguishable trait which precludes him from feeling any sense of moral direction. Raymond frequently lies, and stages situations to determine whether he can get away with abducting a young woman. At first, his fumblings at becoming a victimizer are so awkward that they are almost comical. Little by little, he trains himself as though he were taking up a hobby like building ships in a bottle, and tracks his progress with a mathematical precision in keeping with his profession as a science teacher. His errors and mistakes appear innocent enough to most parties who know him--his daughter thinks he's having an affair at their house in the country, a school acquaintance thinks he's trying to pick up women by offering them a ride in his car--but step by step, he pushes himself to see how far he can go, and how far he can fall. Raymond is not without his own mental complications (aside from the ones I previously described), and also claims to be a claustrophobic, a quality that becomes more relevant in light of his opinion that "killing someone" is not the worst thing he can think of to do to someone. Raymond claims his desire to do evil is a way for him to balance out the good he had done to save a girl from drowning, and justify the praise visited upon him by his daughter, who called him (and rightly so at the time) a "hero". It's a pity that whatever other psychological complications have been inflicted upon Raymond prevented him from simply accepting the compliment. Raymond manipulates Rex, because in a way, Rex wants to be manipulated, and Raymond and Rex engage in a battle of wills. Coincidentally, both "Ray" and "Rex" can be translated to mean "king", as they battle over a territory of secret knowledge. Rex recalls on a tv program that he--like Saskia--recently had a dream that he was floating in space in a golden egg, and saw her, and that again, when the two meet in space, they would be reunited. This vision fills Rex with a kind of mad hope, one that even in his darkest moment, when all other hope is lost, reminds him that he and Saskia will finally be together, and the mystery has at last been resolved--cold comfort, indeed.
Recommended for: Fans of a suspenseful thriller filled with the dread that comes from not knowing, the fear that someone you love might simply vanish without a trace at any moment. And the haunting conclusion will stay with you for a long time afterwards.
Raymond is a self-avowed sociopath, who claims to have a nigh-indistinguishable trait which precludes him from feeling any sense of moral direction. Raymond frequently lies, and stages situations to determine whether he can get away with abducting a young woman. At first, his fumblings at becoming a victimizer are so awkward that they are almost comical. Little by little, he trains himself as though he were taking up a hobby like building ships in a bottle, and tracks his progress with a mathematical precision in keeping with his profession as a science teacher. His errors and mistakes appear innocent enough to most parties who know him--his daughter thinks he's having an affair at their house in the country, a school acquaintance thinks he's trying to pick up women by offering them a ride in his car--but step by step, he pushes himself to see how far he can go, and how far he can fall. Raymond is not without his own mental complications (aside from the ones I previously described), and also claims to be a claustrophobic, a quality that becomes more relevant in light of his opinion that "killing someone" is not the worst thing he can think of to do to someone. Raymond claims his desire to do evil is a way for him to balance out the good he had done to save a girl from drowning, and justify the praise visited upon him by his daughter, who called him (and rightly so at the time) a "hero". It's a pity that whatever other psychological complications have been inflicted upon Raymond prevented him from simply accepting the compliment. Raymond manipulates Rex, because in a way, Rex wants to be manipulated, and Raymond and Rex engage in a battle of wills. Coincidentally, both "Ray" and "Rex" can be translated to mean "king", as they battle over a territory of secret knowledge. Rex recalls on a tv program that he--like Saskia--recently had a dream that he was floating in space in a golden egg, and saw her, and that again, when the two meet in space, they would be reunited. This vision fills Rex with a kind of mad hope, one that even in his darkest moment, when all other hope is lost, reminds him that he and Saskia will finally be together, and the mystery has at last been resolved--cold comfort, indeed.
Recommended for: Fans of a suspenseful thriller filled with the dread that comes from not knowing, the fear that someone you love might simply vanish without a trace at any moment. And the haunting conclusion will stay with you for a long time afterwards.