Alternate Best Actor 1977: Rutger Hauer in Soldier of Orange

Rutger Hauer did not receive an Oscar nomination for portraying Erik Lanshof in Soldier of Orange. 

Soldier of Orange follows a few Dutch resistance soldiers during Nazi occupation during World War II. 

That description probably gives you the immediate wrong impression about this film despite being completely accurate to the plot of this film. The plot is of a WWII thriller, the execution is pure Paul Verhoeven, as it is far more chaotic, horny and satirical then that plot would lead you to believe, despite treating the plot seriously...kinda. It's a strange film that is almost like a party film but the party being held in and around Nazi persecution and fighting the Nazis. Honestly I'm not sure it entirely worked for me in its approach maybe because it is kinda all these things while not being entirely any of them, not that I dislike the film but it is extremely specific in a way that I didn't always adore either. Within its crazed tapestry you have Rutger Hauer as the central role of one of the men who we find in the opening scene will be the Aviation hero who helps lead the Dutch Queen back onto her own soil. We proceed to flashback to try to uncover essentially how this man got there, which is kind of a curious sight to those of us who typically Hauer best in his domineering performances in his English Language roles. As we see the young man enter into a hazing situation where Hauer exudes this naivety and weakness of such a state, and seems like such a passive sort particularly compared to Jeroen Krabbé as the older much more confident Guus. Although the slightly older man takes him under Hauer's Erik under his wing, we see the men become friends in what is driven by Guus's, for lack of a better description, anarchist lifestyle. Hauer however is effective in gradually moving his presence just a bit towards the Hauer of his later years as we see Erik become just a bit more confident around Guus, though certainly the secondary man in their relationship (though for the record of this review Krabbé is supporting). The film's progression however will then surprise one as Holland gets invaded by the Nazis and proceeds to quickly surrender. Something that leads the men to join the resistance, however even this isn't quite the way you'd expect, as even Erik expresses his antisemitism, hardly being a true believer in terms of fighting against the evil of Nazis and more so a nationalistic sentiment. 

The men are almost immediately captured and tortured, where Erik escapes only to be captured again, though let go to be used as bait. And again the nature of the character isn't what you'd expect within the seemingly dire situation, where people are tortured and killed. But even within the approach by Verhoeven Hauer is able to maneuver himself within that specific approach. As he naturally segues to this moment of a bit more gravity, if only for a moment, that even then works into a erotic moment when one of the fiancée's of the men ends up helping him then sleeping with him. Hauer's performance is able to be whatever he needs to be in a scene for Erik, having moments of intense severity in his performance but also scenes of slightly romantic. The men end up leaving to go to England to get formal training where again things don't go as expected as it is much about Erik and Guus both trying to sleep with an English secretary as it is getting prepped to go home and launch some missions. And as strange as all this is Hauer manages to create some consistency by indeed being whatever is needed while creating enough of an arc in the progression of his character to being more charismatic and more confident in each sort of task or change we see. Hauer is good here even what here is, is not anything I've seen quite like this, which is never precisely a compliment. As the film never loses the chaotic sexual energy even when one of the characters gets brutally tortured and guillotined by the Nazis. It proceeds in its own way regardless, as those scenes are interrupted by Erik having sex with the English secretary failing to maintain his potency as he lists all the people he's going to bomb during the war. What Hauer does more or less works in this scene, much like all the scenes regardless of what happens. It's a completely good performance within the scheme of a film that I struggled to entirely reckon with though not for lack of trying on my part or the film's.