De Zaak Alzheimer (The Memory of a Killer) (The Alzheimer Case) Reviews

A watchable thriller, but does feel like a drag at times. It'd have been better if they'd concentrated more on substance than style. 6.5/10.

An interesting premise, and quite suspenseful for the first half. Sadly, this becomes less about Decleir's struggle with Alzheimer's, and more mundane to the point of evaporating into nothingness. I give it three stars for a great first half.

A very neat story that just goes on a bit too long, I hear they have plans for an american remake, so I am interested. Good work between the hitman and the cop, and some very cool scenes, if only it could come together a little better.

As we get older, we find ourselves not functioning as we once did, mentally and physically, so we need to take it easy. Angelo Leddo(Jan Decleir) does not have that option, even as he is losing his memory, because as his business partner Gilles(Patrick Descamps) puts it, people like them in the assassination business cannot retire. So, Angelo takes a job in Antwerp where he can also visit his brother in a rest home. The first part of the job goes as planned but he refuses to kill Bieke Cuypers(Laurien Van den Broeck), an 11-year old who was just at the center of a child prostitution investigation by Detective Chief Inspector Vincke(Koen De Bouw) and Detective Verstuyft(Werner De Smedt) who are also one step behind Angelo.

Even as it goes on much too long with its running debate on the meaning of justice, "The Memory of a Killer" still has moments where it shows the kind of movie it could have been. One key point comes when Angelo is worried if he killed somebody, but the movie does nothing really with this. Actually, the movie has less to do with his degrading memory(so nobody call any lawyers), than his mortality, proving that there is nothing more dangerous than somebody with nothing to lose, as the movie tries to get inside of his head.(For the record and from the information provided, I don't think he is suffering from Alzheimer's disease.) But again I have a problem believing a hitman would have trouble killing a child. At the same time, Angelo does seem rather honorable for his profession. In this job where even the killers are told not to ask questions, some crimes may be too much to handle. Then there are the cliches like the world weary cop(apparently one of a few detectives in Antwerp). So while the political situation in Belgium is unique, bureaucracy and power games seem to be everywhere. To be honest, I had never heard of pissing in a lock before.

Its kind like going to a Kentuky fried chicken in Mexico City, although the plot follows a well worn path, the slight differences pop out at you. When I say a well worn path I do not want to cast dispersions on the acting it was excellent. The most intellectually stimulating part of the movie is understanding how the police and judiciary work in Belgium. De Bouw and Smedt are members of the judiciary and are doing detective work on the path of Ledda a hit man with a conscious. His conscious grows as he senses his own mortality due to rapid onset altimeters. He wants to retire, but its with his history the only way for him to retire is to die. His employer coerces him to go on one last job which to his surprise is an underage prostitute, which is against his code of conduct. The next day the girl is found dead and he not sure if he killed her. This event splits the movie into a multitude of subplots all mildly entertaining

Interesting idea for a story and good execution of showing his condition. I felt the story ran long though especially over the part to get the baron... and in the end, the use of a tape of him making a threat over the phone seems like only circumstantial evidence in a murder case.

Simply excellent stuff. Everything is where it should be: it is full of action and suspense, the killer is depicted as a human being without the film becoming a melodrama, he is very good but still fallible. One problem though: the plots lacks a sens...(read more)e of Belgian-ness, it could have been shot anywhere and in my opinion good noirs have to be set in a given environment, that's were the tragedy comes from.

Not bad. I liked the twist at the end, got a little confused and it dragged on a little too long, but it was worth 2 bucks to see.

A hitman who's suffering from Alzheimer's, this flick is intense and intelligent. Glad i stumbled upon it.

Excellent crime drama with a great script, directing, style, a unique plot, and acting. The idea of a hit man going after those responsible for child prostitution and a child's murder before his Alzheimer's destroys him is original, and all the twists were intriguing.

Very interesting concept...Well done

As we get older, we find ourselves not functioning as we once did, mentally and physically, so we need to take it easy. Angelo Leddo(Jan Decleir) does not have that option, even as he is losing his memory, because as his business partner Gilles(Patrick Descamps) puts it, people like them in the assassination business cannot retire. So, Angelo takes a job in Antwerp where he can also visit his brother in a rest home. The first part of the job goes as planned but he refuses to kill Bieke Cuypers(Laurien Van den Broeck), an 11-year old who was just at the center of a child prostitution investigation by Detective Chief Inspector Vincke(Koen De Bouw) and Detective Verstuyft(Werner De Smedt) who are also one step behind Angelo.

Even as it goes on much too long with its running debate on the meaning of justice, "The Memory of a Killer" still has moments where it shows the kind of movie it could have been. One key point comes when Angelo is worried if he killed somebody, but the movie does nothing really with this. Actually, the movie has less to do with his degrading memory(so nobody call any lawyers), than his mortality, proving that there is nothing more dangerous than somebody with nothing to lose, as the movie tries to get inside of his head.(For the record and from the information provided, I don't think he is suffering from Alzheimer's disease.) But again I have a problem believing a hitman would have trouble killing a child. At the same time, Angelo does seem rather honorable for his profession. In this job where even the killers are told not to ask questions, some crimes may be too much to handle. Then there are the cliches like the world weary cop(apparently one of a few detectives in Antwerp). So while the political situation in Belgium is unique, bureaucracy and power games seem to be everywhere. To be honest, I had never heard of pissing in a lock before.

From the same director of ^LOFT^, this time it's an intense crime aka cop thriller with great characterization that comes with some engaging performance from a good cast of actors. Erik Van Looy's this film is also getting an American remake treatment which is currently in development by Focus Features, Universal Pictures.

Quite a good movie, but it was probably at least 20 minutes too long.

THE MEMORY OF A KILLER (2003)

Its kind like going to a Kentuky fried chicken in Mexico City, although the plot follows a well worn path, the slight differences pop out at you. When I say a well worn path I do not want to cast dispersions on the acting it was excellent. The most intellectually stimulating part of the movie is understanding how the police and judiciary work in Belgium. De Bouw and Smedt are members of the judiciary and are doing detective work on the path of Ledda a hit man with a conscious. His conscious grows as he senses his own mortality due to rapid onset altimeters. He wants to retire, but its with his history the only way for him to retire is to die. His employer coerces him to go on one last job which to his surprise is an underage prostitute, which is against his code of conduct. The next day the girl is found dead and he not sure if he killed her. This event splits the movie into a multitude of subplots all mildly entertaining

There is a rumour floating around IMDB that they're planning to do an American version of this; casting speculation runs rampant, mostly along the lines of people who are way too young for the lead role. So far, however, it seems to be just rumours. A click on "movie connections" brings up an upcoming (2009) sequel, as well as several movies referenced in it, but no American version. The sequel, in fact, is also Belgian and features the same two actors playing the lead detectives. I can deal with it, though I may or may not ever end up actually seeing it; I don't tend to go out looking for sequels, which I would probably have to do in order to see it, since I Netlfixed this one. (And the sequel's called [i]Dossier K[/i], which means we've already passed it anyway.) Still, it looks as though we're going to be escaping the ignominy of a tired Hollywood remake for now.

Angelo Ledda (Jan Decleir) is attempting to be a retired hitman, but his employers do not believe there is any such thing. Clearly, he has not told them that he is suffering from Alzheimer's disease. (Indeed, the Belgian title is [i]De Zaak Alzheimer[/i], or [i]The Alzheimer's Case[/i]. Or possibly [i]Affair[/i]. IMDB does not specify which is the direct translation.) He is sent to Antwerp to perform a hit on Bob Van Camp (Lucas van den Eijnde), a civil engineer of some sort. Before Ledda kills him, he takes something out of Van Camp's safe. Ledda is also sent to perform a job on Bieke Cuypers (Laurien Van den Broeck), which he refuses to do, as Bieke is twelve. We learned, before we encountered Ledda, that Bieke was part of a child prostitution setup; her father and pimp, listed as "Vader Cuypers" (Dirk Roofthooft)--though I happen to know that "Vader" means "father"--pretty much commited suicide by cop in front of her. When Ledda finds out that someone else has killed Bieke, he decides to track down all those repsonsible for her death; there's also the little detail that they've tried to kill him as well.

This is not a crime thriller as a lot of Americans see the term. It's a psychological drama, not a shoot-em-up. It's a police procedural, but I think it's much closer to the roots of true noir. There's no [i]femme fatale[/i], but there is certainly no one you can trust, as we find out as the movie progresses. It is at least closer to the classic noir of the '40s than most modern police dramas. There is but one real gun battle. There are no car chases. There's a fairly high body count as Ledda goes up against those who would see him dead, but the twist isn't really a violent one, even though it would, if things go as planned, lead to Ledda's death.

But then, we know that Ledda is dying anyway. He has visited his brother, Paolo (Roland De Jonghe), in the hospital, and Paolo is much worse off than he. We find out eventually that Ledda's own childhood was not fun, though we can't know for sure if it was as bad or worse as poor, doomed Bieke. At any rate, he clearly feels himself to be her avenging angel, and it is as such that we should be viewing him. Indeed, unlike most movies that feature aging or otherwise retiring hitmen--see also [i]Grosse Point Blank[/i]--we don't see any of his old jobs. We see him in happy intended-retirement in Marseilles. One rather wonders if they would have sent him anyway if they'd known.

Let us be clear. This is not a conventional mystery. After all, we know who did it right away, except in one case, and we learn who did it in that one awfully quickly. What we are learning is who hired him and why. It is the why, more than the who, that draws us in; we learn the who pretty quickly and easily. There is something, we know, in that safe at the Van Camps', and that something is what is driving Anton Ledda. The point of the game is to find that something and who is linked to it. Lead detective Eric Vincke (Koen De Bouw) and his partner, Freddy Verstuyft (Werner De Smedt) are playing along with us; Vincke saves Ledda's life in order to acquire more of the information. It is, in fact, Vincke and Verstuyft who will be driving the sequel; that alone makes me think I might go looking for it.

While trying to polish up my first three 1980s entries I stopped to see a few newer movies.

[b]The Memory of a Killer[/b] - Belgian movie about a hitman who is hired to kill a 12 year old girl who was implicated in a child prostitue ring, but balks at the job. When someone else kills her he goes after the men who hired him to murder the child. What makes this one different is that the hitman is an older gentleman suffering the devastating effects of Alzheimer's. It has a good cast, including two detectives who are out to solve the death of the 12 year old girl, and also the deaths of those being killed by the hitman. Pretty damned good.

[b]The Grudge 2 -[/b] redundant, with no scares and the same story, if it can be called that, with different actors. Completely pointless.

[b]The Covenant[/b] - horror lite, and stupid. How in the hell do movies like this get made and released widely? It's beyond me.