‘Holland’ – Review
If you’re looking for something twisty and electric then Nicole Kidman’s kooky suburban-mystery thriller Holland will keep you wired with its unique approach to the unsettling feeling that lurks beneath the surface of suburbia.
Teacher and homemaker Nancy Vandergroot’s (Nicole Kidman) picture-perfect life with her husband and son in Holland tumbles into a twisted tale. Nancy and her colleague become suspicious of a secret, only to discover nothing in their lives is what it seems.
Nicole Kidman returns to the thriller genre with Holland, a film that peels back the layers of suburban life to reveal the darkness lurking beneath. Directed by Mimi Cave, known for her work on the critically accalaimed and totally oyt-0there Fresh, this movie intertwines suspense, satire, and psychological drama, offering viewers a complex narrative set against the backdrop of the seemingly idyllic town of Holland, Michigan.
Kidman portrays Nancy Vandergroot, a meticulous home economics teacher and devoted mother whose life revolves around her family and the community’s Dutch-themed traditions. Her husband, Fred, played by Matthew Macfadyen, is an optometrist with a peculiar hobby of maintaining an elaborate model train set in their basement, symbolizing the control he exerts over their domestic life. Their son, Harry, portrayed by Jude Hill, adds to the facade of a perfect family.
The narrative gains momentum when Nancy suspects Fred of infidelity after discovering a crumpled ticket from Madison, Wisconsin, contradicting his stated whereabouts. Her suspicions lead her to enlist the help of her colleague, Dave Delgado, a charismatic shop teacher played by Gael García Bernal. As they delve deeper into Fred’s activities, Nancy’s world unravels, revealing secrets that challenge her perceptions of trust and loyalty. The film masterfully portrays Nancy’s transformation from a composed homemaker to a woman consumed by doubt and paranoia.
Holland is layered with intrigue and mystery, and it does play with audiences expectations, while also building out a burgeoenoing sense of paranoia, and the audience is left questioning what is real in Holland. While there’s the pretext of Holland being perfect, there’s also a serious sense of perfection. and comfort that creates a tone of tension and unease, and this is only further fed by the bonkers dream sequences that continually afflict Kidman’s Nancy. Kidman has built a career with notable suburban set films that examine the evil beneath the surface, but Holland feels completely different from these, and is again kept in line with Cave’s esoteric direction.
Holland is a film that is entirely different from what we first expected and it delivers a sense of suspense, psychological drama, and dark humor, the film invites audiences to question the narratives we construct about our lives and the secrets that lie just beneath the surface.
Image: Prime Video
