The Age of Exploration (or age of Discovery). Those 200 years (more or less) from 1450 to 1650, when a few brave men coming from Western Europe, traveling in fragile wooden ships and armed with primitive fire weapons, basically conquered the world. It's strange that very few movies have been made out of that era. Perhaps this is so because this era is now a bit politically incorrect (since it many times involved Europeans invading and conquering Native people). But movies dealing with early polar exploration should not have such a problem, since there were few if any native people there. So here comes this fine film from the Netherlands that tells the true story of Willem Barents, the Dutch navigator that seeking a Northern route to China (Spain, being in war with the Netherlands at the time make it difficult for Dutch ships to go to the east through the Cape of Good Hope) reached in 1596 (more than three centuries before the North Pole was reached) the island of Nova Zembla in the High Arctic Sea, an island that is now a part of Russia. However, the ice soon broke the ship and the crew has to spend in the island a harrowing winter. Shot in 3D mostly in Iceland, this film is handsomely made, with a good, classic storytelling. The story is mostly told through the eyes of Gerrit de Veer, the young, inexperienced chronicler in the expedition. Famous Dutch model Doutzen Kroes has a small role, appearing mostly in flashbacks, as Gerrit's fiancé back in Holland (she was obviously hired because she was believed to be a box office draw, not because her character was really needed in the story).

Nova Zembla doesn't hold up to the promises made. In fact, it fails utterly, which, truly, is a shame. An adventurous story, a beautiful setting and (for Dutch standards) good acting but all that cannot make watching this film bearable.The storytelling is unbelievably slow. While being promised an action-packed heroic story it instead halts drastically every time a little climax should be due, resulting in the opposite. And if your film is to be made for a Dutch audience based on a classic Dutch history lesson almost every Dutch person will remember, you just can't get away with it. Not even with showing random scenes of Doutzen Kroes' breasts.The cast was fine though and the acting wasn't particularly bad. The lines didn't seem forced and it all had a genuine feel, which is often lacking in Dutch films. The technical side of this film wasn't bad either and the effects, costumes, locations and props are a rare perfect blend.It is clear this film lacked the experience of a great captain and should be a learning opportunity for inexperienced director Reinout Oerlemans. Nova Zembla fails to hoist the colours and sail full speed ahead and instead feels more like a rowing boat without oars. A typical trailer-beats-film.

With this movie I got very ashamed to be a Dutch citizen. I've never seen such a terrible Dutch movie before. Doutzen is certainly not an actress. If I wanted to look at a supermodel I would go to the website of Victoria Secret. Also Robert de Hoog (known from TV-commercials) couldn't live up to the expectations. Furthermore do I own a 3D TV, and I think the special effects aren't that special. They say the movie costed about 7 million euro's. I doubt that very much. It's sad to say but I think this movie is another moneymaker to the producers. It is based on one of the oldest stories from Holland but it is told very bad and as thin as paper. Combine an awful cast and there it is, another terrible Dutch production not worth seeing.

Luckily Oerlemans dared to finally choose a serious subject for a film after his two ridiculous and degrading movies about a small village near the Meuse riverside (Maaskantje). I was very surprised to hear that Nova Zembla would be in 3D, because most 'normal' movies (not animation-films I mean) are not totally in 3D and the effect doesn't blow me away at all. The 3D effects of Nova Zembla are not impressive at all, even for my low expectations. Although the moment of the ice bear-attack is a little exiting, most shots of the bear remind me of my last visit to the Zoo when I was little and will not be remembered as breathtaking. Now let us talk about boobies, because I had an overdoses of boob in the first quarter of the film that in my view didn't add anything to the story whatsoever. Enough about the technical aspects of the film. Let us focus more on the story that Oerlemans is telling us. In primary and middle school in the Netherlands, the subject Nova Zembla as the beginning of the exploration era with the 'Golden Age' as paramount moment is a well known story. But it is a little old and dusty. Oerlemans lures both adults and children to the cinema and teaches us about the explorers of the sixteenth century in the most vivid way possible. We see the men with beards and strange clothing boarding a relatively small vessel full of faith and confidence in the success of the expedition. At the island we see them suffer but still confident that they will get back alive after the winter darkness. Apart from some individuals that do not survive, most of them do in fact what brings an kind of happy ending to the film. Thank you Reinout, for renewing this old story about those brave men.