Amsterdamned (1988)

	Also Known As: -
	Year of first release: 1988
	Director: Dick Maas (The Lift, Down, Saint)
	Actors: Huub Stapel (The Lift, Saint), Monique van de Ven, Serge-Henri Valcke
	Country: NL
	Genre: Horror, Thriller
	Conditions of visioning: 07.01.2014, DVD, Home cinema
Synopsis: A prostitute is murdered and hung in Amsterdam, The police starts to investigate while more murders occur.
Review: Let me start with a bit of background story. I know about Dick Maas since I watched The Lift maybe 20 years ago. It is a good minimalist horror thriller with an original concept. I have also seen the remake the director made himself 18 years later (Down) which is fun as well. I have recently seen Saint (reviewed here) and didn't like it so much. But I couldn't resist buying Amsterdamned (what a brillant title) when I found it for 99 cents in a bazaar. Also I have visited Amsterdam 1.5 years ago so I am now familiar with its canals and steets geometry. I was not dissapointed by the movie! As I have read on the web, it is a good thriller but with enough blood to satisfy the horror fans as well. No wonder that it won a price at the Avoriaz film festival (now replaced by Gerardmer). The movie was shot in the English language to attract more audience, so sometimes the dialogs feel misplaced, but it fits with the 80's atmosphere. The famous 6-minute boat chase in the canals deserves its reputation. I was impressed by the quality of the cinematography (framing, editing, composition) throughout the whole movie. I only regret not having bought the recent re-edition by Shameless Films (covers below, DVD only, as there seems to be no film allowing a proper Blu-ray transfer), the company that brought me Four Flies of Green Velvet and Cannibal Holocaust, as the video quality would have been much better (my DVD almost looked like a VHS).
Rating: 7 /10