Chirphymium It's entirely possible that sending the audience out feeling lousy was intentional

Brenda The plot isn't so bad, but the pace of storytelling is too slow which makes people bored. Certain moments are so obvious and unnecessary for the main plot. I would've fast-forwarded those moments if it was an online streaming. The ending looks like implying a sequel, not sure if this movie will get one

Nicole I enjoyed watching this film and would recommend other to give it a try , (as I am) but this movie, although enjoyable to watch due to the better than average acting fails to add anything new to its storyline that is all too familiar to these types of movies.

Zandra The movie turns out to be a little better than the average. Starting from a romantic formula often seen in the cinema, it ends in the most predictable (and somewhat bland) way.

George D. Dodge This movie intrigued me right from the beginning, with unusual twists and turns with a surprise ending.Very well directed and written, and the music carries it well too.Being a big fan of Michael Cain, he did not disappoint and fit the role perfectly. No one could have done it better.The DVD is in my collection, and I watch it often. It's always enjoyable and despicable as well.It's the personification of evil versus good.I would recommend this movie to anyone except children.Enjoy! I always do..

fedor8 Another absurd thriller from Frankenheimer; almost a specialty of his, creating convoluted political thrillers that make little sense. The script's blatant disregard for logic must have made him fall in love with it immediately.The other three Nazi kids had known about the covenant since their childhood, and yet Caine somehow didn't have a clue. This is already the first glaring logic problem in THC. It is very difficult to believe that Palmer (Caine's mother) only found out about it when he did. That's almost impossible, given that practically everyone else knew. In fact, her behaviour suggests that she almost certainly knew. But that begs the next question: why the hell would she not tell Caine about it (much) earlier? If for no other reason than to warn him about it, giving him sufficient time to prepare for ensuing hoopla – and of course to increase his chances of survival.Are we to believe that Palmer was part of the conspiracy to kill her own son, a plan that had been abandoned by the anti-Nazi organization "Wolfsschanze" after the first attempt at Caine's life at the dock? It doesn't quite make sense. Palmer isn't portrayed as a zealous fanatic, ready to sacrifice her son's life at the drop of a hat, on some hunch (not even a certainty) that he might enable neo-Nazis to get that money. In fact, even if she WERE a zealot ready to allow his murder, then she would have had all the reasons in the world to tell him about the covenant years earlier, so that she could groom him in a proper way to make him avoid making errors that might lead to disaster, and to avoid having to assassinate him.This is not the only glaring idiocy in the relatively convoluted plot. It is hard for me to imagine that "Wolfsschanze", an apparently very serious and well-organized secret group, would be so utterly daft as to not suspect Tennant right after finding out that her brother had murdered their leader and Palmer. Did they really think that he could have been hiding his Nazi sympathies from his own sister for decades on end? Even Caine not ever suspecting her made little sense, except if we believed that he was a totally naïve imbecile.The writer tried to cover up for Caine's lack of suspicion by making him fall in love with Tennant, but that's a fairly dubious touch, too. After all, Caine and Tennant had only just met 3-4 days earlier, yet already he's "in lurve"? I could understand if an uneducated, low-IQ, wide-eyed, gullible 20 year-old fell head-over-heals so quickly and easily - but a successful, intelligent architect in his mid-40s, and surrounded with such sudden pressures and fears? Come on. Any half-way intelligent man would have grown suspicious after Tennant had professed her love for him – on the 2nd day since they'd met! Very sudden and highly suspicious; at this point I knew she was out to get him. Add to that all those billions waiting in the bank, and corpses piling up: what man would possibly not at least suspect her of some ulterior agenda. Perhaps not illogical, like the whole Lili Palmer business, but certainly quite far-fetched.The kidnapping was very obviously staged. I don't know whom the director was hoping to fool with that. In fact, Tennant's fake abduction simply made me more certain that she and her brother were the "baddies".The great irony is that Tennant is such a bad actress, a typical silver-spoon-in-mouth hand-her-a-movie-career-on-a-plate nepotist, hence for her to be playing a character that is so successfully deceptive (fooling everyone) is almost comical. She isn't as wooden as she normally is in her other movies, but definitely a semi-amateur. The less said about Mario Adorf being miscast as a CLASSIC ORCHESTRA CONDUCTOR, the better. The man looks like a butcher, rugby player, or Welsh miner. They might as well have cast Ernest Borgnine or Lino Ventura for the role.The leader of "Wolfsschanze" using that rather silly "Nazi-test" on Caine: that was pretty shaky too. Ditto the fact that Tennant's brother would be so stupid as to leave the scene of a double-homicide without erasing or taking away the tapes that show him as the killer. All these years of planning, scheming, and everything else – and yet he makes this strictly amateurish error: far-fetched, dumb even.The premise that 4 and a half billion dollars could be used to destabilize the world with terrorism isn't far-fetched. However, the idea that this money could be used to destabilize the world to such an extreme extent that "a new strong leader" would then emerge – a Nazi at that – and take over the reigns, that is certainly foolish thinking, nothing that should have anyone too worried. If only it were that easy. Vast amounts of money can perhaps make Oscar winners out of crap like "Milk", but certainly not produce magic. Besides, how the hell did the trio of covenant creators know for sure that any of their offspring would follow the same political path as they did? In spite of all the absurd goings-on and very loose logic, THC is a fun movie, interesting from start to finish. Casting Caine in the lead certainly helped.

dscabicky What in heaven's name was a talented director like John Frakenheimer doing involved is a mess of a movie like this? Clearly he was desperate for work but just as clearly his talent had ebbed at this point in his late career. 'Holcroft' is awful on so many levels it's difficult to know where to begin. The script is muddled and confusing. The dialogue is clunky. The music is incredibly annoying. The performances--including Caine's--are wooden. I never read the book but it can't have been as bad or boring as this film makes it out to be. Don't waste your time with this trash. It doesn't make a bit of sense and it's not even a little bit entertaining.

ozthegreatat42330 All of the elements for a great thriller are there. An outstanding director, John Frankenheimer, An excellent source author, Robert Ludlum and a great leading man for thrillers, Michael Caine. What went wrong? The biggest problem I had with this film was the cinematography. The film was grainy and the sub-titles were very hard to read when the actors were speaking German. There were plenty of the usual Ludlum plot twists and misdirections, but somehow the feel of this film was not up to the usual standards of Frankenheimer or Caine. A lot of it is just too kinky for most people, but an accurate portrayal of Berlin during the cold war years. It would have faired better had it been released ten years earlier rather than later. It does deserve an E for effort.