Hello everybody and welcome to a brand new review! For this one, I will be taking a look at an Amazon Prime Video released film that came out back in March titled Holland. I’ll admit, I didn’t know a whole lot about this one prior to its release save for the cast and it being some sort of thriller with Nicole Kidman in the lead role. The trailer looked pretty intriguing and I do like a good psychological thriller like this seemed to be. Even though the reviews weren’t that good, I was still interested in giving this a shot. Was it able to warrant the curiosity? Let’s jump right in and see if Holland is worth visiting!
The film takes place in the year, 2000, in the small mid western town of Holland, Michigan where we follow one teacher named Nancy. She lives an average middle class life existence with her optometrist husband, Fred, and 13 year old son, Harry. Recently, Nancy begins to suspect her husband of cheating on her due to more and more conference trips occurring. Thus, she enlists the aid of fellow teacher, Dave, in order to figure things out leading to one hell of a journey.
Best known for directing the 2022 horror film, Fresh, I can admire what Mimi Cave and writer, Andrew Sordoski, were going for here as they are trying to go about telling this story in a wave that involves melding different tones and genres together as while it is primarily thriller, they also try to weave in domestic drama as well as comedy and psychedelic thrills in for good measure. Unfortunately, I don’t think they were able to crack it. The film struggles in juggling all of these elements making for a feature that doesn’t know what it wants to be, leading to a bunch of different scenes aiming for different purposes being strewn together. It feels like we something that wants to be tongue in cheek while also providing some genuine urgency in regards to the plot, but this doesn’t manage to handle that.
It doesn’t help that while there is some intrigue that arises here and there, the main story feels lacking. The themes that are being tackled certainly aren’t new (perfect societies having something dark brewing underneath, the way victims of abuse are gaslit into thinking everything is okay, etc.) but are still interesting and relevant in today’s cultural and political landscape. There are hints of interesting ways of tackling these ideas and some individual scenes can be effective in this regard, but the script on the whole is half baked and fails to develop them. Even when it comes to certain reveals, they can be interesting on paper, but are not fleshed out enough to be anything to write home about. This also applies to how the feature wraps up which is ambiguous but in a way that feels like Sordoski didn’t know how to end things, so he just went with what we got which felt pretty unsatisfying.
Now, I do think that the movie is at the very least well made from a technical perspective. While I wish more was done in regards to developing the town of Holland as it feels like there was more to be explored in how it functions and the inhabitants living there, the folksy and pleasant feel is captured well by the cinematography which shows off some beautiful looking landscapes and architecture that still has a feeling of unease throughout. There are some nice contrasts in regards to this colorful mirage of happiness that this places evokes, to the darker things going down which is shot with less saturated colors and darker hues. It even creates some neat visual irony when the two elements are combined. I’ll also give credit to editor, Martin Pensa, who is able make certain sequences hit harder from an intensity stand point with a lot of effective quick cut editing and slow burn reveals that at the very least made me curious as to what could happen.
There’s also a large amount of style present here and that is what does make film a bit more interesting. Parts of the film can get pretty trippy, getting us into the tumultuous mind of our protagonist and her thoughts and they get the job done in terms of visual storytelling as well as potential foreshadowing. I don’t know if these parts always mesh well with the movie (largely a byproduct of the inconsistent tone), but they are visually interesting and honestly convey what the movie is aiming for the most successfully. Also thought the use of model trains in certain scenes was a nice touch and even tied into the film’s message of control.
I’ll admit that in the moment, with this talented trio of actors, I wasn’t quite sure of what to make the performances as they were going for a specific vibe that I don’t know if it initially worked for me. After thinking about it, I do think that for what he script is asking of them, they do actually do the job pretty well. Nicole Kidman brings a lot of manic energy to Nancy which serves as a front to her inner frustrations and anxieties of her husband. It takes some getting used to, but Kidman gives the performance some nice nuances that are especially present as the movie goes on. Problem is that I didn’t Nancy to be all that compelling of a character as her development doesn’t really feel fulfilling or lead to anywhere interesting as she feels rather static.
Gael Garcia Bernal’s Dave fares a little bit better in this regard as he’s arc is clear and has interesting aspects (he’s need to be 100% honest with Nancy about this potentially unfaithful relationship they might get into, him not being totally being accepted into the community due to his ethnicity, etc.). However these aspects are often either brought up in a sentence and not explored thoroughly or are barely touched upon at all. I feel Matthew Macfadyen brought in the best work of the three as Fred, doing well in portraying him as a “loving” husband who has some secrets up his sleeve. He may have played things a little too suspiciously at times, but I did find myself at least wondering where his allegiances lie, which is at least something, even if I feel there are things that happen with him that either strewn credibility or could’ve been furthered (the whole family dynamic in general is just looked into on the surface level which was disappointing).
All in all, I found Holland to be an extremely messy film that failed to come together in a satisfying manner. There are interesting ideas at play, the themes are relevant, it’s well made with some neat psychedelic scenes, and the performances are interesting in what they are going for and work. However, it fails to mesh the different tones it is going for, so many ideas end up feeling half baked, and the characters end up feeling underdeveloped when all is said and done. If one likes the talent involved and is in the mood for something weird and ambitious like this, then maybe there’s some mileage to be had, but I feel like there will be more people walking away unsatisfied by this more than anything. At the very least it makes for an interesting misfire as there is a vision here that could’ve been pulled off, but it just didn’t get there for one reason or another. I can see why Amazon opted to put this one straight to streaming as I don’t think it had a chance in hell theatrically (even I do think it would be nice to get more films like this at the theatrical level). Still, I hope Cave’s next project fares better and I do prefer movies that fail in this manner rather than ones that fail due to laziness.
Rating: C-
Please leave your thoughts down below in the comments and see you guys later!
Review Time 