Director Paul Verhoeven subtly breaks new ground with Black Book, his normative breach complementing a script that surprises and entertains with its audacity.

The heretofore whispered truth to which Verhoeven gives voice is that during times of oppression — racial, religious, or otherwise — people’s courage wanes quickly, and they are fairly willing to curry favor with the villainous, or even collaborate with them for personal gain. These people are you and I, not the guy with furtive glances and a handlebar mustache that he twists while cackling. A correction of this errant perception allows Verhoeven to apply his art.

Based on true stories, the drama takes place in the German-occupied Netherlands during the waning days of World War II. As he did with Basic Instinct, Verhoeven leverages our myopia and prejudices to build his thriller.

Prior to the Nazi occupation of Holland, the beautiful and talented Rachel Stein, a Jewish singer, led a life blessed by comfort and wealth. Now in the middle of the war, although she and her family have evaded capture, life is perilous. Then, in an apparent turn of fate, they secure passage into Allied territory, through the assistance of a compassionate, gentile attorney. Gathering their life savings—jewelry, cash, and gold — they and other Jews board a barge at night, stealing into the dark toward freedom. A German patrol boat interdicts their escape, mowing the passengers down in a hail of machine-gun fire. Only Rachel, who dives overboard, manages to escape. Rescued by the Dutch underground and with more than a little taste for revenge, she becomes a resistance fighter.

Improvising to avert a near disaster on her first mission, Rachel, aided by her wiles, squeezes into a train compartment with a German officer, the very handsome Ludward Muntze, who heads up the Netherlands Gestapo. Their mutual attraction during the train ride foreshadows the upcoming twists and turns that serve an intriguing narrative. Going their separate ways upon disembarking, we know they will meet again.

This occurs sooner rather than later, when Rachel, after a debriefing on her mission, is assigned to seduce Muntze, putting the resistance literally in bed with the enemy. The singer’s disguise, which amounts to bleaching her hair blond, is weak, and her cover, at least as it relates to her race and religion, is blown.

But nothing is what it seems to be, and what starts out as another inspired tale of courage vs. injustice during the Holocaust eventually turns itself inside out. As layers of subterfuge unwind, Black Book deftly evaporates our illusions without the arrogance of plot acrobatics. The revelations are an integral part of the narrative.

Black Book deserves praise on many levels. It begins to take the straitjacket off history, by introducing complex characters and situations into a painful period that has too long been held in artistic check.