The Vanishing (1988)
Dutch couple Rex and Saskia are vacationing in France. After stopping at a busy gas station, Saskia goes inside to buy some drinks and never returns. Three years pass, and it is unknown whether or not she is dead or alive. Rex is still obsessed with finding Saskia and eventually begins to receive communication from the supposed abductor. Will Rex ever find out what happened to his lover? The chilling ending of this top-notch thriller shocked audiences all over the world (and me).
George Sluizer’s The Vanishing (Spoorloos) was inspired by Tim Krabbé’s 1984 novella titled “The Golden Egg” and was published as The Vanishing in English speaking countries. Krabbé also wrote the screenplay for the film. The film received the Golden Calf award for best feature film that year at the Netherlands Film Festival and the lovely Johanna ter Steege (Saskia) won a European Film Award for Best Supporting Actress. Sluizer directed an American remake of the film in 1993 that was not received as well as the original Dutch film, mainly because the ending was altered so drastically.
Comments
The Vanishing is maybe the creepiest movie I've ever seen, mostly because it is such a plausible nightmare. The remake is the perfect example of what happens when Hollywood gets ahold of something awesome that scares them because it isn't formulaic enough.
Right, I remember both laughing and yelling "No! No!" at the end of the remake. Cop-out endings (Godzilla) are bad enough, but it's embarrassing when the charm or style of the original is completely lost on Hollywood (Wings of Desire, La Femme Nikita, Solaris) and they try anyway.
This happened to be on tv last weekend and I watched it.... It haunted me for two days. But it was good!