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Holland (2025) is a quaint suburban town in Michigan and "the best place on earth", according to Nancy Vandergroot (Nicole Kidman), a middle school teacher with a zest for life. She lives with her husband Fred (Matthew McFadyen), and son Harry. But something sinister bubbles under the surface of this fantastical life.
When Nancy suspects Fred of infidelity, she enlists her colleague Dave's (Gael García Bernal) help and they develop feelings. The duo discovers that Fred is a serial killer targeting women, depicting their lives through his miniature train model set. Dave tries to murder him but fails. In the end, Nancy succeeds.
The film received mixed reviews and left fans with questions. Here are seven head-scratchers from Holland and what they could mean for its vague ending.
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Disclaimer: All opinions belong to the writer. This article contains spoilers, so proceed with caution.
What do these events in Holland mean? Unanswered questions from the movie
1) Why is the film named Holland?
The film uses the titular Michigan town as its premise, but nothing further than that. It does not make use of the time period or the town's many moving parts, like its people or aesthetics, to convey a message. In movies like Fargo (or its show counterpart), the storyline revolves around all the characters being connected to the town.
This unanswered question leaves fans wondering what the point of the film is. Is it simply that the thriller drama is set in the titular town?
2) How will Fred's crimes, and his murder, be explained?
Fred is a serial killer and the bodies of his victims must be discovered at some point. Will they be traced back to him? And if law enforcement does, how will Nancy explain Fred's disappearance since she murdered him? It could not be easy to hide multiple murders in a small town like Holland.
3) Does Harry ever realize what is going on?
The film shows a close bond between Fred and his son Harry (Jude Hill). They build miniature towns and train sets together and the child is a happy-go-lucky product of Nancy and Fred's marriage.
With all the horrific things going on in his home, does Harry ever realize that his doting father is a serial killer? In Nancy and Fred's climactic fight, Nancy ends up killing Fred after asking Harry to run. Does Harry ever find out his dad is dead? Surely, a child must have questions, but this remains a mystery.
4) How did Fred survive being stabbed by Dave?
Dave Delgado follows Fred to a lake house where he finds him murdering a woman in cold blood. Dave stabs him in the stomach and he falls into the lake. Dave returns and tells Nancy she doesn't have to worry about Fred anymore.
Unfortunately not. Fred reappears during Tulip Time and Nancy realizes that the threat is far from over. The question is, how does someone survive a stabbing and an almost drowning?
5) Is Dave Delgado even a real person?
The ambiguity around Dave's existence is the most confusing aspect. Viewers have an unreliable narrator in Nancy, so they don't know in the end if Dave is a figment of her imagination because of her clawing need to escape her suffocating marriage. Or is he a version of herself?
The fact that Dave's murder attempt on Fred resulted in nothing left viewers confused about whether he was even real. What's more, his appearance in scenes without Nancy further indicates the film's improper structuring.
6) Is Holland an imaginary town created by Fred?
Some fans speculate that the miniature towns and train sets indicate the entire storyline happening in Fred's head. His cryptic dialogue about clicking "Reset" and going back to the start where nothing bad has happened might point to this entire story not existing.
7) Finally: Is the whole movie about Nancy's psychotic break?
Nancy is stuck in a virtual time loop. Every day is the same - husband, work, kid. Through the course of the movie, it might appear like Nancy builds the entire storyline about her husband being a serial killer, falling for a colleague, and murdering her husband in the end, as a way to escape her mundane life.
Nancy keeps muttering "Is this even real?". There also appears to be a glitch in the movie, where Harry appears older than he is for just a split second. This might indicate that the entire thing is a simulation in Nancy's head.
Mimi Cave's Holland appears to be intentionally vague to leave the interpretation up to fans. However, that has left more questions than answers about her psychological thriller.
