TBS (2008)

Johan van der S. (Theo Maassen) has been deemed beyond treatment and will have to spend the rest of his life in the long-stay ward of a forensic psychiatric clinic. Johan admits that he killed his father, but insists he is innocent of the sexual murder of his little sister, for which he was convicted. He says he killed his father for what his father did to her. Since no one will believe him, Johan escapes to prove his innocence. He does so by taking a staff member hostage with another inmate and threatening her with tools from the workshop. The other inmate rapes the woman and then, as is revealed later in the film, kills her. Johan says goodbye to the inmate and goes to the home of his mother (Sacha Bulthuis), who has cut off all contact with him. Johan is convinced she can clear his name, but she is not there. The police pull up, and he flees by car. With the police on his heels, Johan takes 13-year-old Tessa (Lisa Smit), who is waiting for the bus with her friend, hostage. Over the course of the film, she makes two unsuccessful attempts to raise the alarm and one unsuccessful attempt to escape. At the same time, trust and sympathy also develop between them (Stockholm syndrome). She is even allowed to eat chips, smoke, and sometimes drive the car. She is also somewhat touched that Johan took her hostage instead of her friend because, he says, there is something special about her. She asks Johan whether he is attracted to her; he leaves the question unanswered. He also buys her earrings. They go to the home of Johan’s grandmother (Pim Lambeau). Tessa is locked in the trunk while Johan goes inside. His grandmother lies, saying she does not know where Johan’s mother is. As is revealed later in the film, Johan kills his grandmother. He finds a postcard with the address where his mother is staying, at a campsite in Belgium. With Tessa’s help, they make their way there, switching between various stolen cars. Tessa goes inside with him. Johan’s mother refuses to help him and says he is crazy. In Tessa’s presence, Johan kills his mother. The Belgian police pursue them and hold them at gunpoint. They are about to shoot Johan, but the authorities’ hesitation makes things more difficult: Tessa is now sitting on Johan’s lap, making it riskier to shoot him. This forces Johan to secure safe passage to the Netherlands. He also briefly takes an intrusive journalist hostage. Back in the Netherlands, Johan tells Tessa she can leave, but she is worried about him and wants to go with him a little longer to support him. Johan drives her to the harbor, where he has hidden a small box containing jewelry belonging to his victims. He cares deeply about Tessa, and when she tells him she will write to him and visit him, he wants her to know who he really is. He tells her the truth and shows her the box of jewelry. Tessa panics and hyperventilates. When Johan tries to calm her and holds a paper bag over her mouth for her to breathe into, he can no longer restrain his murderous urges and strangles her as he apologizes. He loved Tessa so much that he had to keep making an effort to control himself all that time. He did not want to hurt her because she was kind to him and was a real friend. In the end, it is too late for Tessa, and he can no longer control himself. He adds her earrings to his collection and surrenders to the arriving police after throwing Tessa’s body into the canal, mourning what he has done. The earrings were initially meant for Tessa, but something in Johan told him he would end up doing it sooner or later anyway. Since Tessa did not have any jewelry, he bought her the earrings.