Don't Touch My Children (2010)
A film inspired on the true story of the two abducted children of Janneke Schoonhoven. She struggled 2 years to get her abducted children back to Holland, from the father that took them to Syria.
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Very disappointing...
Powerful
Absolutely the worst movie.
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.
Basically, what we get is another variation of Not Without My Daughter" (1991), likewise based on a true story: Hanne (Karina Smolders, playing a role similar to Sally Field's Betty Mahmoody) is a naïve young woman from The Netherlands, who marries Arab Nazim (Cahit Olmez), has two children with him, both which are abducted by his father to his native Syria. A legal and eventually physical struggle to reunite the children with their mother ensues.It would have been easy to turn this film into a pure tear-jerker, based on sentimentality or prying on the audience sense for the sensational, but "Kom niet aan mijn kinderen" actually remains rather neutral, unsentimental, and essentially non-judgemental.For contemporary standards, the film doesn't try to ride the "politically correct" wave that is currently popular in Europe; rather, it shows us the sober results when modern-western culture clashes with a mentality that is basically rooted in the dark-ages. Special credit must be given to actor Olmez: again, it would have been easy to draw his character as an essentially atavistic character but his portrayal goes deeper than that. Nizar isn't some backward fundamentalist, but rather a victim-turned-abuser; scarred by a paranoid upbringing in a restrictive society and feeling abused and unwanted in Europe, we feel that he loves his children but simply cannot jump over his own shadow. There's a fine line between feeling sympathy for Nizar and outrage at the way he treats his children and (ex-)wife."Kom niet aan mijn kinderen" is obvious made-for-TV; isn't big, hyped cinema like above mentioned Not Without My Daughter", but that's an advantage, rather than a limitation. It's unlikely you'll come across this film outside of Europe or even outside of Europe's more quality-geared TV-channels, but if you do, I can recommend it over the melodramatic "Not Without My Daughter" anytime.6/10