Reviews

If you are thinking about watching this 2023 mini series..... think twice. I would strongly urge you to consider watching instead at least series 1 of the original Dutch version "The Swingers". Sadly I didn't, but at least it gave me a direct comparison.

In my opinion, the acting in this series is all pretty wooden with maybe the exception of Danny. Pete's character seems to be a token gesture to satisfy the 'inclusivity' agenda. He is completely miscast and his performance in the final episode is cringe worthy.

The plot is really implausible and goes from far-fetched to ridiculous. But my worst bug-bear is, while episodes 1 to 5 are watchable, the whole series is destroyed by an appalling set of outcomes in episode 6. It was as if the writers became bored with it, or didn't have the airtime to produce something half believable. The Dutch version carries effectively the same plot over 10 episodes.

Two final frustrations; firstly, why does everybody leave their front curtains open in the evenings when sensitive things are taking place; and secondly, how do so many near-death characters manage to come back to life.

It is all beyond me.

Could have scored a 7 or 8 but with all its weaknesses a 5 is best I can do.

The series started off on a great footing and although it was rather slow-paced to begin with, it was nonetheless entertaining and engaging. I thought it showed great promise as a "real" grown-up psychological thriller. This was accompanied by some pretty good acting.

Sadly, after some 4 hours viewing, episode 5 introduced some real fantasy rubbish (referred to as 'astral projection' or something similarly far-fetched). By the conclusion of the series this 'dream activity' had stretched the plot far beyond the realms of plausible reality. For me, the best outcome of the story was the well deserved demise of Louise for her relentless immoral behaviour.

All of this did, however, provide for some interesting twists in the finale and, looking at the reviews, it would seem that the majority of viewers were seriously entertained regardless of the completely unbelievable storyline. So, the more you are able to close your mind to reality and enjoy the fantasy spirit world then the more you are likely to be entertained by this series. If you aren't able to do this then I would recommend you leave well alone.

I really wanted to enjoy this series which appeared to have much promise. Although it had a few badly conceived issues in the early episodes, it was nonetheless engaging and pretty entertaining.

Sadly, I was soon disabused of these opinions as a consequence of the significant plot flaws and implausible situations. Whilst the overall acting performances were pretty good, this was undermined by outrageously dislikeable characters and too many unbelievable relationships, not to mention wholly incompetent cops. Mary's "holier than God" (albeit at a hefty charge!) despicable attitude, together with her ingratiating smile (smirk?), soon became a real turn-off.

In common with most extended series the desire to continue the programme for as long as possible resulted in contrived plots that increasingly detracted from the original premise. For sure, series one may have justified a review score of 8 or so, but by the end of series three things had transgressed well beyond the bands of believability such that I couldn't see past a score of 2 or 3. Hence my overall rating of 6/10.

I am the first to appreciate that entertainment quality sometimes needs to stretch the realms of reality but there has to be a balancing degree of plausibility. At the conclusion of this series the fact that Mary, Des and Ben had all avoided lengthy jail sentences epitomized the reality problems depicted by the programme.

Overall I enjoyed this series. It was fast-paced and kept my interest all the way through. I particularly enjoyed the multi layered stories surrounding the two main families involved. Although I was watching on subtitles it was still easy enough to follow the plots. I binge watched series 1 and 2 (22 episodes over three days) but found it a little harder to complete series 3 (10 episodes over three days).

As with a lot of extended series, the desire to keep it going resulted in major plot weaknesses between each series, resulting in contrived and unrealistic story lines. These had to be 'mentally' overcome to enjoy series 2 and more so series 3. My main issue was with the ridiculously light or non-existent punishments and jail terms given to the two principal offenders i.e. Huub Couwenberg (bribery and corruption, kidnapping and accomplice to murder) and Pepijn (corruption by a public official, perverting the course of justice and incitement to murder). Silly concocted reasons were given to enable these characters to continue their relentless immoral activities into the next series. Mainly for this reason, I would score the individual series 9, 7 and 5 respectively. Hence, overall, I gave it an 8/10.

Series 1 could easily have been made to stand on its own without the need for the contrived plots. Even after series 2, more appropriate jail sentences would have brought the story to a more satisfying conclusion. Sadly, on top of the totally unrealistic punishments handed out to Huub and Pepijn at the end of series 2, digging up the revengeful brother and sister duo from the past to concoct a plot for series 3 really was detrimental to the overall series. Everyone in series 3 was committed to getting Huub, including his own grandchildren, who were now after his money. At the end of series two I wanted Huub to get his comeuppance, but by the end of series three I was really pushing for him to get away, and the final help from his son, Bjorn, was a really nice touch.

My other bugbear was Sylvia Hoeks (Iris). For me, her acting was atrocious, lacking any real emotion or expression. She was totally unconvincing and her character was lifeless, almost zombie-like, and extremely annoying. So much so, that by halfway through series two, I actually began disliking every scene in which she appeared.

On the plus side, the complex characters of Kees Prins (Huub Couwenberg, the psychopathic, hateful entrepreneur) and Guido Pollemans (Bjorn, the subservient brain damaged son) were brilliantly portrayed. Incidentally, in my opinion, Bjorn was the only character who was likeable throughout the entire series (and I hated the paying-off of the money-grabbing 'girlfriend').

I would thoroughly recommend watching this series, even if only the first series. And, as for icing on the cake, the soundtrack, derived from Huub's vinyl record collection in each episode was absolutely brilliant....almost worth watching just for the music.

A real bundle of garbage. A ridiculous plot with rubbish script and poor acting all round! Seriously so unreal, even by TV movie standards. The final act in particular was outrageously stupid. What cops would let a couple of hysterical woman walk into a hostage situation, between them and an idiot with a gun??? Watch a Disney cartoon instead - it will more than likely have a more realistic plot!

This film was clearly mis-sold. It is in no way based on true events. And that explains why the ending is so abrupt; no mention of casualties/survivors; no mention of the cause of the crash (only limited speculation); and no attempt to pursue the issues raised in the aftermath.

Prior to the crash the film was OK; not brilliant by any stretch of the imagination but watchable. And then it ended.......so disappointing.

I feel totally short changed.

A ridiculously weak plot and poor script with mediocre acting to boot!

Brannagh should have gone immediately to the police instead of playing along to the point of becoming almost complicit in the heinous crimes. I have to agree with "geoffox" that Brannagh's facial expressions were often scarier than the crazed oppressors. In fact, some of her actions were just as stupid as the culprits. For example, when she breaks into the father's house with a gun pointed at him and claims she wasn't going to kill him; come on, get real.

It was very difficult to stick with (my wife kept telling me off for my constant moaning!). How convenient that the oncoming bus just happened along at that point when there was virtually no other traffic on the road. Perhaps if the nutter hadn't paused for quite so long on the bus steps when fleeing she might have missed it!

The story line sounded promising and the review score seemed to support this.

However, in my opinion, the plot was seriously unrealistic and the script turned out to be ridiculously weak. As well as all the plot holes listed by "gustheaffen", there was the carrying of the corpse in the street and passing her off as being drunk to a passer-by; the wife's gullibility in not challenging Eagle's strange behaviour; no explanation as to why Bobby's son turned against him thus driving the final nail into his coffin; the coincidence of the murderer confessing to the police on the same day as Dom tells all to them, to mention just a few more!

The three main characters were frustrating from the beginning giving few clues that that were indeed true friends. Eagle was grossly selfish, Bobby was a ranting loser and Dom was thoroughly weak. None of the characters were at all likeable which probably explains why I thought the acting was also pretty poor.

I suppose if they had gone to the police at the outset (like most sane people would have done) there wouldn't have been a film.........sad or what?

Since my wife bought me an Amazon Fire Stick for Christmas I have become an addict of Netflix and Prime Videos. I am retired and on some days have watched as many as five films. To date I have watched 247 films, all listed and graded (sad, I know, but it saves wasting time watching ones I've already seen!).

I always read some of the IMDb reviews on every film I watch (after the event) to get a feel for how my rating compares to the average user. Usually, I tend to score slightly above the published rating. But not in this case!

What I find amazing about the reviews of this film is just how succinct they all (6) are and the sentimentality of them is almost nauseating. On every other film I've watched there are many reviews that are almost dissertations and very few of just two or three lines.

I have never previously posted a review because I've never considered them to serve much value. No matter how good a film's reviews are there are always numerous reviewers who love to slate it, and vice versa, just to be different it seems. Everything possible has already usually been said (often replicated many times ad nauseam). So one extra review from me isn't going to make any difference.

The 8.2 rating for this film caught me totally by surprise. After 20 minutes viewing I had to pause the film to go and check the online ratings to verify I was watching the right film. I then trusted that the film had to get better but that was not to be.

I am no film critic but this has to go down as possibly the worst film I have ever seen (The Human Centipede apart!). Everything about it was third rate; the plot, the dialogue, the sets, the acting....everything was sooo bad.

The girlfriend was pretty frightening, the two 'best friends' were completely insincere, and as for the two children, well, cardboard cutouts would have been more believable. As for the girl's continuous mobile photo shooting, I would have shoved that mobile somewhere else! The corny piano playing soundtrack was also pretty annoying.

There was a complete lack of background extras. There were no other customers in the cafe scene and no one appeared out on the streets, what little outside footage we saw. I was looking forward to witnessing the congregation in the church scene but alas there was no set at all for that. Even the paramedics in the penultimate scene turned out to be just the siren. And no funeral scene?

However, at the end of the movie everyone turned to God and all was saved. Sorry, I do not mean to offend by being blasphemous, but really? Everything about this film was phoney.........how about those reviews?