Cheap Spetters (DVD) (Paul Verhoeven) Price

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Customer Reviews of Spetters

BETTER THAN EVER ON DVD....
This is a revision of my earlier concerns. "Spetters" is blissfully intact on DVD and looks better than ever. The directors' cut I had on tape didn't look this good. I was afraid it had been edited when I saw it was listed as "R" but it's unrated still and 8 minutes longer than on my tape. This film is about the lives of three young men who race motorcycles. They long to compete with their hero (Rutger Hauer) who is wealthy and famous. They come from diverse middle class backgrounds. One is abused by his violent father and bashes gay men for their money. Their lives are disrupted and changed forever by a beautiful ambitious blonde who rolls into town with her fast food wagon that she operates with her butch gay brother. Her involvement with the boys will lead to triumph and tragedy as well as sexual awakening. Renee Soutendjik walks off with the film as the golddigging blonde. She is amazingly beautiful and sensual in her earthy performance. She would play another vamp of a different kind in Verhoevens' "The 4TH Man". "Spetters" is a must see for Verhoeven fans of his earlier pre-Hollywood work. It is also sexually explicit and contains a disturbing homosexual rape scene. This scene is important to the story developement but it is graphic. Some may be put off by it. Still, "Spetters" tells a story and I can't recommend it enough for lovers of truly cinematic film.

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Brilliant teenage drama for adults
This movie is a classic on it's own (I can't wait for it to come out on DVD). The story of a group of teenagers in the 80's in the Netherlands, stuggling to become something more then middle-class, and finding out they might be something different altogether. Very realistically brought to life, with quite shocking scenes. Nothing is spared to the viewer, definately not a film for teenagers or younger. Includes violence and a gay rape-scene, among others, with Paul Verhoeven's accurate and raw portrayal of a time and a people. No sugarcoating here.

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When is the video or DVD coming out?
This film is really great. It's about three young, cocky Dutch guys whose lives revolve around Motorcross racing and their encounters with a cute, ambitious, smart working-class girl who lives in a trailer and is a short order cook around the Motorcross site.

It is ultra-realistic and true to life and at the same time over-the-top and absurd to satirize the equally ridiculous but more fleeting absurdities of everyday life; in fact, 'real life' is much more absurd than anything that happens in this movie, but 'toned down,' and harder to notice, except upon reflection. With 'over the top' movies like "Spetters" the absurdities we all notice (and are often a part of) are turned 'way up high' for instant and easier identification and reflection. Other great movies of this type I've seen are Verhoeven's American version of "Spetters," "Showgirls," Sam Fuller's "Shock Corridor," Ken Russell's fantastic uncut version of "Crimes of Passion," and Mathew Bright's first "Freeway," but "Spetters" tops them all. It is the ultimate masterpiece of 'over-the-top' satire.

Try to find a well-stocked video store that carries the uncensored, subtitled Director's cut for rent (it's got some very graphic sex scenes in it with full fronal nudity, and a homosexual gang rape that makes anything in "American Me" look tame); it's a well transferred version which came out on HBO video a few years ago, and is now unavailable for sale for some reason; I'd buy it in a second if it was available.