Oesters van Nam Kee is a tragic love story from The Netherlands, starring
Katja Schuurman as Thera, a young exotic dancer, and Egbert Jan Weeber as
Berry, a High School dropout from a good family who is hanging around with
thugs. The film has not been seen much outside of Holland, although it was shown at
one festival in North America and one in Germany.
The film opens with Berry doing something with a gun, then fleeing to an
old family home in France. The rest of the story is a flashback to the 5
months leading to that moment.
Berry meets Thera while selling some devil's horns he took from the scene of a
hit and run accident (they belonged to the victim). She bought a pair, and
then the two went out for Chinese food, thus the title, which
translates, "Oysters at Nam Kee's." The date ends badly, but she gives him a
card and suggests that he see her dance at work. The two eventually end up in bed
together, and quickly become inseparable. They plot some way to get enough
money to travel, and finally hit upon a scheme that nets them enough. They
check into a high class hotel to wait for travel arrangements, but the
relationship starts to unravel, and then she has an epileptic seizure, is
hospitalized, and her mother chases Berry off. He does not react well.
The first act works well, although it was never clear why Thera would date
a kid like Berry, but the film goes rapidly downhill along with their
relationship. In my opinion, the film exists to show Katja Schuurman's body in full
body nudity in the hot sex scenes, which are the best part of the
film. Given her body, maybe that is reason enough.
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If you are not familiar with our grading system, you need to
read the
explanation, because the grading is not linear. For example, by
our definition, a
C is solid and a C+ is a VERY good movie. There are very few Bs
and As. Based on our descriptive system, this film is a:
