Sorry about 'Holland,' Holland
Prime
As expected, Googling “DMX Nicole Kidman” doesn’t lead to anything. So the Kidman-starring “Holland” has, in fact, added something to the world when the 2000-set drama incorporates DMX’s permanently energizing “Party Up.”
Other than that, good luck finding much in this massively disappointing follow-up to director Mimi Cave’s debut feature “Fresh.” In “Holland,” set in the titular Michigan community that has Dutch roots but is not, you know, in the Netherlands, Nancy (Kidman, playing another unsatisfied suburban wife) knows that any outsider perceptions of her life as perfect is only a facade. Even though people act like Holland is some kind of Pleasantville-esque utopia — as Nancy is seen watching “Mrs. Doubtfire,” potentially for the first time, it’s possible she just hasn’t seen “Pleasantville” yet — Nancy is lonely and bored with a life where a wild night at home means replacing yellow mustard with brown mustard. Plus, her husband Fred (Matthew Macfadyen) goes to a suspicious quantity of out-of-town conferences for a small-town optometrist, and after Nancy bonds with new teacher Dave (Gael Garcia Bernal, playing another educator cozying up to a married woman like in “The Kindergarten Teacher”), she decides to investigate the affair she’s sure Fred is having when he’s away.
Though the Amazon plot summary falsely adds “un” to claim this garbage is “wildly unpredictable,” “Holland” needs about 12 more twists to justify spending this much time on something so simple. It also lacks the necessary red herrings to create the suspicion that would prevent the third act from being both obvious and coming out of nowhere. That Nancy and Dave supposedly have some enormous connection, and not just a brief adventure driven by proximity and near-total lack of information, is one of many things that you won’t buy about Andrew Sodroski’s script, which often feels like it’s playing Midwestern city Bingo. (Fort Wayne! Madison! Grand Rapids! Frankenmuth!)
At times feeling like it’s built out of the “Gone Girl” flashbacks without an ounce of style or edge, “Holland” is memorable only in Nancy’s son (Jude Hill) swearing by saying he’s “cheesed off” and for a scene of him showing his dad Pogs. (Again, it was 2000.) If not for an opening scene featuring Rachel Sennott (“Saturday Night”) you’d swear “Holland” — which should’ve been set in the modern day and able to feature an action sequence at this Dutch Village — had been sitting on the shelf for 20 years. Regardless, this disposable bore is recommended only for people who think “American Beauty” has aged great, or stream nothing but Prime and are too lazy to scroll two inches down from new releases.
D+
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