Reviewer Flickchart Ranking: 3,529 / 5,722 (38%)
Welcome to Holland, Michigan, courtesy of Amazon Prime and famed music video director Mimi Cave. It’s her follow-up to her debut feature, the cannibal horror Fresh (2022), and it stars professional discontented wife Nicole Kidman (Babygirl, 2024), the ubiquitous Gael Garcia Bernal (Cassandro, 2023), and a beloved Mr. Darcy (Matthew Macfadyen). Are Cave and company able to capture a foreboding whimsy, or does it feel as stale as many of Kidman’s movie marriages?
Nancy Vandergroot (Kidman) is a home-ec teacher in 2000s midwestern-ville. Her husband Fred (Macfadyen) is a trusted optometrist who shares a passion for toy trains with their son Harry. Nancy is isolated in her life, school, and home, and we meet her as she is beginning to gradually unravel. She has a friend at work, shop teacher Dave Delgado (Bernal). Immediately we see their connection; she becomes animated around Dave as the two share gossip and listen to true crime radio broadcasts. Nancy begins to be suspicious as Fred travels to conferences frequently, and not all of his details immediately add up. Dave and Nancy begin their own detective work to see what exactly Fred is up to.
There is nothing unique about the setup to Holland, from the frustrated-wife storyline in an affluent small town premise to the standard beats the story takes. Cave and director of photography Pawel Pogorzelski (Ari Aster’s regular DP) create a rich visual world that teeters on dark whimsy à la The Stepford Wives (2004), but always manage to keep the film firmly grounded in turn-of-the-century middle America. Unfortunately, nothing about the story or characterizations is distinctive or engaging. Everything feels like an early draft before the writer (first timer Andrew Sodroski) went back to “add color” to it.
Holland comes across as a lifeless, unloved product that leaves it to its cast to make these people intriguing. Cave seems solely focused on making Holland visually appealing, but without a strong sense of character her attempts often fail. Kidman and Bernal are always welcome screen presences, but their chemistry in Holland is elementary and the mystery at the heart of the story unfolds with a whimper.
Holland is for Kidman die-hards and those who love any kind of light-hearted, small-town mystery. Otherwise, it is a thriller without thrills, a mystery that isn’t intriguing, and a vehicle for flat characters that lack personality.
