As far as I'm concerned there is some great acting (Carice van Houten, Barry Atsma and Anna Drijver do a great job with what is given) and there is nothing wrong with the way the director chose to tell the story. He may not be the most original or most experienced, but it was adequate at least.
I particularly liked the fact-of-the-matter style of portraying the scenes concerning the whole process of going through the diagnostics and the treatments in the hospital. The scene where Carmen says goodbye to her little daughter was also very well done; of course such a scene is touching by itself, so it's hard not to make it tacky. It wasn't.
What bothered me throughout the film however is that it is very hard to identify with the main characters or at least grow to understand them. That is not an acting nor a directing flaw, that flaw is embedded in the way the original story is written.
The autobiographical story stays annoyingly shallow and self-centered in it's explanation of the motivations for the behaviour of the main character (himself) with little character development nor room to really learn to understand him. At the same time the way the writer portrays the character of his wife stays shallow as well, not giving us as the viewer/reader a lot of insight in her decisions, drivers or emotions. There are only some scenes that gave us a glimpse of that, like the one that I mentioned earlier with the last goodbye to her daughter, and the one in which she breaks down in the tunnel after the party. Those were also the better and more moving scenes.
To summarise: good acting, good directing, flawed story.
I particularly liked the fact-of-the-matter style of portraying the scenes concerning the whole process of going through the diagnostics and the treatments in the hospital. The scene where Carmen says goodbye to her little daughter was also very well done; of course such a scene is touching by itself, so it's hard not to make it tacky. It wasn't.
What bothered me throughout the film however is that it is very hard to identify with the main characters or at least grow to understand them. That is not an acting nor a directing flaw, that flaw is embedded in the way the original story is written.
The autobiographical story stays annoyingly shallow and self-centered in it's explanation of the motivations for the behaviour of the main character (himself) with little character development nor room to really learn to understand him. At the same time the way the writer portrays the character of his wife stays shallow as well, not giving us as the viewer/reader a lot of insight in her decisions, drivers or emotions. There are only some scenes that gave us a glimpse of that, like the one that I mentioned earlier with the last goodbye to her daughter, and the one in which she breaks down in the tunnel after the party. Those were also the better and more moving scenes.
To summarise: good acting, good directing, flawed story.