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Among the grey German uniforms of the Sicherheitsdienst (SD), the intelligence branch of the SS, and the black uniforms of the complicit Dutch police, navigates a man in a bright blue suit and a tan overcoat and fedora; this is Dries Riphagen (Jeroen van Koningsbrugge). Being a prominent enough figure of the Amsterdam underworld to have the nickname “Al Capone”, Riphagen collaborated with the Nazis during the German occupation of the Netherlands in WWII; exposing resistance groups, and hunting down and blackmailing Jews that had gone into hiding.
Unlike the traditional “rise and fall” gangster film, Riphagen the Untouchable (2016) starts with Riphagen at his zenith. After an SD officer addresses the Dutch police, offering bounties on Jews that have gone into hiding, Riphagen approaches the policemen and presents them a better deal if they turn over the information straight over to him. He can be seen wandering in and out of the police department, sliding dollar bills to officers in exchange for information. But Officer Jan van Liempo (Kay Greidanus), who is secretly working with the Dutch resistance, takes an instant disliking to Riphagen, quickly putting out his cigarette and telling Riphagen he doesn’t smoke when he asks for a light.
In some ways this is one of my biggest problems with Riphagen the Untouchable, we really don’t see much of the titular character in traditional criminal circles. Unprovided are all the ways that gangsters are seen making money: prostitution, gambling, drugs, etc. The only hint of the criminal underworld that we get is when Riphagen socializes with others criminals at different gambling clubs. It’s clear from how the other criminals treat him that Riphagen has some sort of pull in the underworld, but we’re never told how much. But the crimes we do see Riphagen commit are diabolically cruel. Offering hiding Jews safe passage for their belongings, and eventually themselves, Riphagen cons them into handing over their valuables, like diamonds or jewelry, which he will hold for them until the war is over. Riphagen keeps the con going long enough until the Jews he has fooled refer other Jews to Riphagen, and he amasses a nice payday. He kicks some of the goods up top to the SD (everybody wants a piece of the action), but in the end Riphagen keeps the lion’s share for himself, turning in the names and locations of his victims to police when he has bled them dry.
Officer van Liempo is present at one of these arrest, and the old Jewish woman that Riphagen crosses feels so betrayed and guilty (she giving the names of other Jews for Riphagen to help has signed their death warrants) she brutally commits suicide on the spot by stabbing herself several times in the stomach. Van Liempo’s obsession of distaste with Riphagen is magnified when the resistance group he is working with is compromised due to a Jewish informer working for Riphagen, and his comrades are murdered by police. Van Liempo’s hatred becomes so focused, eventually one of his fellow resistance members asks him “There are plenty of traitors in this city, what’s so special about him?”
But Jews aren’t the only people that Riphagen ends up conning. A chance meeting with a waitress named Greetje (Lisa Zweerman), who is filling in for her sister at a diner that Riphagen frequents, causes him to show up at her house with flowers. When she answers the door with tears in her eyes, her drunken father can be heard screaming in the background. Riphagen barges into the house and not only beats and subdues him, but allows both Greetje and her mother to sock him in the face. The two are in love and soon married after that, but Greetje is aware about Riphagen’s association with the SD. When asked, he lies and says that he is only working with the SD so he can help save Jews.
Riphagen’s criminal empire starts to crumble when the Nazi empire is penetrated on D-Day by the Allies. At this point, van Liempo has put Riphagen on a “death list” with resistance members. When his criminal associates ask him to lighten up on his Jewish victims, sensing a turning of the tide in the war, Riphagen realizes that his fate will be similar to the Nazis if captured, and he tells his associates that if he goes down he’s taking all of them with him. As the Allies get farther into Europe, Riphagen attempts to flee East, but not before he is shot in the leg by van Liempo. Believed to be dead, Riphagen returns to Amsterdam to go into hiding, where suspected Nazi collaborators are being murdered by resistance members in broad daylight.
At this point, the crippled Riphagen is very reminiscent of Caesar Enrico "Rico" Bandello from Little Caesar (1931). Rico (Edward G. Robinson) is forced into “…the gutter from which he sprang” when the cops turn up the heat on his organization. His fall is sudden and sharp, as Rico is seen from staying in the most lavish of apartments to hiding out, face full of stubble, in a flophouse. Rico is soon gunned down by police while hiding in squalor, his last words famously being “Mother of Mercy! Is this the end of Rico?” As if his ego is stunned he could be killed in such a fashion.
Riphagen moves from place to place, cane in hand, while in hiding. Much like Rico, he is also seen from living in the most luxurious of apartments, which he stole from a Jewish family he informed on, to sleeping on cots in backrooms. He even has to embarrassingly stay with his father-in-law, who he emasculated at the beginning of the film. But Riphagen doesn’t share Rico’s fate. While Rico’s temper and ego was his undoing while under the pressure of a manhunt, this is Riphagen at his most cunning. As the war winds down, and resistance members move into government and law enforcement positions, Riphagen plays them against each other to escape justice. He claims that it was van Liempo who betrayed resistance members, and Riphagen continues to plead his innocence. He is able to manipulate leaders of law enforcement, now in charge of hunting down Nazi collaborators, into bringing him across the border.
At its heart, Riphagen the Untouchable is a gangster film. The use of the word “untouchable” in the title brings to mind Al Capone, whose wardrobe style Riphagen adopts through the movie. In Hits, Whacks, and Smokes: The Celluloid Gangster as a Horror Icon, Catherine Don Diego argues that “some of the most terrifying realist horror offerings in the cinema are better known as gangster movies.” Diego argues that the mayhem and murder portrayed on screen in a gangster movie is far more frightening than a supernatural based horror movie because it is based in reality. There can be no better example than Riphagen, where a monster among monsters in a blue suit roamed the underbelly of Amsterdam; stalking and toying with his prey.
Spanning three episodes in Germany, the only version with American subtitles is currently streaming as a two hour movie on Netflix.
RATING:
Nazi Enforcer: A Review of Riphagen the Untouchable (2016)
Among the grey German uniforms of the Sicherheitsdienst (SD), the intelligence branch of the SS, and the black uniforms of the complicit Dutch police, navigates a man in a bright blue suit and a tan overcoat and fedora; this is Dries Riphagen (Jeroen van Koningsbrugge). Being a prominent enough figure of the Amsterdam underworld to have the nickname “Al Capone”, Riphagen collaborated with the Nazis during the German occupation of the Netherlands in WWII; exposing resistance groups, and hunting down and blackmailing Jews that had gone into hiding.
Unlike the traditional “rise and fall” gangster film, Riphagen the Untouchable (2016) starts with Riphagen at his zenith. After an SD officer addresses the Dutch police, offering bounties on Jews that have gone into hiding, Riphagen approaches the policemen and presents them a better deal if they turn over the information straight over to him. He can be seen wandering in and out of the police department, sliding dollar bills to officers in exchange for information. But Officer Jan van Liempo (Kay Greidanus), who is secretly working with the Dutch resistance, takes an instant disliking to Riphagen, quickly putting out his cigarette and telling Riphagen he doesn’t smoke when he asks for a light.
In some ways this is one of my biggest problems with Riphagen the Untouchable, we really don’t see much of the titular character in traditional criminal circles. Unprovided are all the ways that gangsters are seen making money: prostitution, gambling, drugs, etc. The only hint of the criminal underworld that we get is when Riphagen socializes with others criminals at different gambling clubs. It’s clear from how the other criminals treat him that Riphagen has some sort of pull in the underworld, but we’re never told how much. But the crimes we do see Riphagen commit are diabolically cruel. Offering hiding Jews safe passage for their belongings, and eventually themselves, Riphagen cons them into handing over their valuables, like diamonds or jewelry, which he will hold for them until the war is over. Riphagen keeps the con going long enough until the Jews he has fooled refer other Jews to Riphagen, and he amasses a nice payday. He kicks some of the goods up top to the SD (everybody wants a piece of the action), but in the end Riphagen keeps the lion’s share for himself, turning in the names and locations of his victims to police when he has bled them dry.
Officer van Liempo is present at one of these arrest, and the old Jewish woman that Riphagen crosses feels so betrayed and guilty (she giving the names of other Jews for Riphagen to help has signed their death warrants) she brutally commits suicide on the spot by stabbing herself several times in the stomach. Van Liempo’s obsession of distaste with Riphagen is magnified when the resistance group he is working with is compromised due to a Jewish informer working for Riphagen, and his comrades are murdered by police. Van Liempo’s hatred becomes so focused, eventually one of his fellow resistance members asks him “There are plenty of traitors in this city, what’s so special about him?”
But Jews aren’t the only people that Riphagen ends up conning. A chance meeting with a waitress named Greetje (Lisa Zweerman), who is filling in for her sister at a diner that Riphagen frequents, causes him to show up at her house with flowers. When she answers the door with tears in her eyes, her drunken father can be heard screaming in the background. Riphagen barges into the house and not only beats and subdues him, but allows both Greetje and her mother to sock him in the face. The two are in love and soon married after that, but Greetje is aware about Riphagen’s association with the SD. When asked, he lies and says that he is only working with the SD so he can help save Jews.
Riphagen’s criminal empire starts to crumble when the Nazi empire is penetrated on D-Day by the Allies. At this point, van Liempo has put Riphagen on a “death list” with resistance members. When his criminal associates ask him to lighten up on his Jewish victims, sensing a turning of the tide in the war, Riphagen realizes that his fate will be similar to the Nazis if captured, and he tells his associates that if he goes down he’s taking all of them with him. As the Allies get farther into Europe, Riphagen attempts to flee East, but not before he is shot in the leg by van Liempo. Believed to be dead, Riphagen returns to Amsterdam to go into hiding, where suspected Nazi collaborators are being murdered by resistance members in broad daylight.
At this point, the crippled Riphagen is very reminiscent of Caesar Enrico "Rico" Bandello from Little Caesar (1931). Rico (Edward G. Robinson) is forced into “…the gutter from which he sprang” when the cops turn up the heat on his organization. His fall is sudden and sharp, as Rico is seen from staying in the most lavish of apartments to hiding out, face full of stubble, in a flophouse. Rico is soon gunned down by police while hiding in squalor, his last words famously being “Mother of Mercy! Is this the end of Rico?” As if his ego is stunned he could be killed in such a fashion.
Riphagen moves from place to place, cane in hand, while in hiding. Much like Rico, he is also seen from living in the most luxurious of apartments, which he stole from a Jewish family he informed on, to sleeping on cots in backrooms. He even has to embarrassingly stay with his father-in-law, who he emasculated at the beginning of the film. But Riphagen doesn’t share Rico’s fate. While Rico’s temper and ego was his undoing while under the pressure of a manhunt, this is Riphagen at his most cunning. As the war winds down, and resistance members move into government and law enforcement positions, Riphagen plays them against each other to escape justice. He claims that it was van Liempo who betrayed resistance members, and Riphagen continues to plead his innocence. He is able to manipulate leaders of law enforcement, now in charge of hunting down Nazi collaborators, into bringing him across the border.
WARNING: "Riphagen" spoilers below
While waiting for his wife, van Liempo exposes Riphagen for the monster he is, and she gives up his location. Van Liempo surprises Riphagen face to face with a British Sten Mark III, intending to finish the job he started when he only wounded Riphagen in the leg. But, Riphagen eventually gets the drop on van Liempo, and chokes him to death, leaving his body in the street as he drives to freedom; abandoning his wife and newborn child.
WARNING: "Riphagen" spoilers below
The film ends with Riphagen fleeing Europe, but his story doesn’t end there. He would travel from Spain to Argentina, where many Nazi war criminals escaped to, and became acquainted with President Juan Peron. He settled in Buenos Aires, where he ran a photography press, and worked for President Peron’s secret service on the side. After Peron was overthrown in a coup in 1973, Riphagen returned to Europe, and would die of cancer in Switzerland the same year.
At its heart, Riphagen the Untouchable is a gangster film. The use of the word “untouchable” in the title brings to mind Al Capone, whose wardrobe style Riphagen adopts through the movie. In Hits, Whacks, and Smokes: The Celluloid Gangster as a Horror Icon, Catherine Don Diego argues that “some of the most terrifying realist horror offerings in the cinema are better known as gangster movies.” Diego argues that the mayhem and murder portrayed on screen in a gangster movie is far more frightening than a supernatural based horror movie because it is based in reality. There can be no better example than Riphagen, where a monster among monsters in a blue suit roamed the underbelly of Amsterdam; stalking and toying with his prey.
Spanning three episodes in Germany, the only version with American subtitles is currently streaming as a two hour movie on Netflix.
RATING: