BroadcastChic Excellent, a Must See

TaryBiggBall It was OK. I don't see why everyone loves it so much. It wasn't very smart or deep or well-directed.

Tayloriona Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

Stephanie There is, somehow, an interesting story here, as well as some good acting. There are also some good scenes

Tom Dooley The plot is an old man who was the leader of the SS Deaths Head Division wants to give an interview from his prison cell to a certain journalist. It is rumoured that he knows of the whereabouts of 'the white raven' this is a large diamond worth a ton of cash or 100 million USD. It was last seen in a German concentration camp when it was used to barter for the life of one of the Rothschilds. Well this journalist is Tulley Windsor and he is a hard drinking and smoking no nonsense type of guy. He heads off and blah blah lots of fisty cuffs, lots of over weight heavies, over acting that would make a pantomime dame cringe and a plot so full of holes as to be almost transparent.This really is a turkey, the acting is OK in places, but the script is amateurish and childish – it's the sort of thing that may work for a young audience who want a good bit of adventure and never mind the facts. The ending is barf inducingly bad. It is not a lack of money either as this had tons to waste. This is the sort of film where you don't hear the helicopter till you see the helicopter or in this case a police car with sirens blaring. I really wanted this to get better, there are some great locations in Poland and places and I really like a bit of international intrigue, this though manages to shoot itself in the foot repeatedly. Do yourself a massive favour and avoid like an arse kicking contest.

sol **SPOILERS** Laughable and outrageously inept thriller that has to do with this crazed and committed former Kommandant of the Treblinka concentration camp Markus Strand, Jan Nubes. Strand after 40 years in solitary confinement in a Warsaw prison has not opened his mouth, except when he ate his meals, is now about to go public about the missing and fabled Rothschild 287 caret cut diamond "The White Raven" that he and only he knows where it is. It turns out that over the years Strand had become a big fan of Christian Science Monitor and Pulitzer prize winning reporter Tully Windsor, Ron Silver, and wants to tell his story only to him. Tully, playing hard to get, is anything but interested in having the scoop of the century until he finds out that both his mother, who supposedly killed herself, and grandma were somehow connected with the hot rock.The film "The White Raven" has three stories, all very confusing, running concurrently in it. There's the Triblinka concentration survivor Frau Hanna Rothschild, Elizabeth Shephard,who the "White Raven" originally belonged to wanting it back. Hanna is also involved ,with the Paris Rothschild Bank as a front, with the Israeli Mossad in funneling million of dollars, or franks, to Isreal in it's, or the Mossads, many covert and undercover operations in Europe as well as the Middle East. There's also the determined US General Dodd, Doug Lennox, who was involved in the liberation of Treblinka even though it was liberated by the Soviet Red Army. Gen. Dodd feels that he has it coming, the diamond, in that he was the one who saved it's owner concentration camp inmate Hanna Rothschild from a fate worse then death. Dodd is now looking forward to have the rock or the 100 million dollars that it's worth as part, together with the measly government check that he gets from he US Army, of his retirement.The triple, or third story, in this incomprehensible mess of a movie has to do with Warsaw police inspector Zielinski, Jack Recknitz,a man who seems to be not only above the laws of his own country Poland but even the laws of nations like Norway and the United States. Zielinski goes without as much as a fear in the world of being caught and prosecuted, and in full view of witnesses, shooting people down together with his band of Warsaw hit men in all three country's. We learn that Zielinski wants the diamond for less selfish reasons then both Gen. Dodd or Madam Rothchild in his mad dream of jump starting, with the money that he'll get for it, a new and more improved Fascist movement in Europe with him of course as it's top banana or kielbasi.Tully is truly ridicules as a secret agent type, outdoing even a James Bond, as he escapes from every jam or hammerlock that the bad guys get him into even though he's not supposed to be an action hero in the movie. As for his non stop running and acrobatics, as well as dodging bullets, he's anything but in shape to preform them with Tully puffing away and smoking pack after pack of cigarettes in almost every scene, including when he's doing roadwork, in the film. The secret of the missing Rothschild Diamond turns out to be locked up deep in Tully's own Uncle Boy's or Edwin Koch,Jerzy Zydkiewicz, head. But to get Uncle Boy to open his mouth would be somewhat of a miracle on Tullys, or anyone else's, part in that he's never talked, like Kommandant Strand, since the end of WWII. Unlike Strand Uncle Boy is suffering from what seems like an advanced case of Alzheimer's Disease where he couldn't talk even if he wanted too.P.S there's also actor Roy Scheider in the movie as Tully's former boss at the Monitor Tom Heath. Scheider had enough sense to keep himself scarce in the movie "The White Raven" where he was hardly noticed except if you were awake or conscious enough to spot him, in the few minutes that he was in it, in the beginning and end of the film.

Asur I guess that when starting a movie like "The White Raven", a team has two basic choices. They can make a James Bond type of film in which the hero will keep falling into traps most terrible from which he will miraculously escape with his life and tie undisturbed - which is quite OK because we all know in advance that he is indestructible. Or they can make a realistic movie in which the hero is very much destructible and has to depend solely on his wits and on some more or less sympathetic people to survive - if he does survive at all; we can never be sure.And then there is the third type which tries to combine the first two - which seems to be a sure formula for disaster. "The White Raven" is, of course, just one of many such movies which may start, as this one does, quite decently in the realistic direction and then suddenly turn around, becoming more and more laughable right to the last "deus ex machina" (in this case one of the most stupid I have ever seen).As such, the movie could perhaps be enjoyed as an unintentional parody if it were not for repeatedly ghoulish scenes which make one think that its authors are fetishists of a rather unpleasant sort; and only to their kind can "The White Raven" be safely recommended.

charlie-114 I didn't buy it, it was Star, she brought it home from the video store. She wouldn't say why she bought this particular movie, but I can venture a guess. It must have been in the "dollar to own" basket right by the register.A dollar seems to be a paltry sum, but in this case, alas yes, it was far too much. That dollar would have been better served in the cup of a homeless man's crack fund rather than spent on this film. It was supposed to be a thriller, but b'gum, it wasn't thrilling. Instead the director served up, Polish extras in a go-go disco, a supposedly mad Nazi (who had the most coherent lines in the film), a murderous Polish police sargent and a corrupt American general (who throughout the film could be interchangeable.Ron Silver smokes and runs simultaneously at one point and you think if he could only smoke run and act he would have something there. According to this film, the way you elude the Warsaw police department is to jump behind a wall when they are approaching ... EVEN IF THEY SEE WHERE YOU HID! The only saving grace of the film was that in the deleted sex scene we didn't have to witness Ron Silver taking his shirt off.Roy Schieder seemed to be saying his lines while watching the clock, one had the feeling that he had an early tee time and wanted to wrap up his scenes in time to hit the links in the afternoon. The only real tangible enjoyment we pulled out of the film was that now we have a new standard with which to judge really bad movies. We can say "That film may s**k, but it's no White Raven!"