Unmasking ‘Holland’ at The Triplex

Ben Elliot, left, Creative Director of Triplex Cinema in Great Barrington and Andrew Sodroski, screenwriter of the movie “Holland” introduce the film at a special screening on March 22. Sodroski warned the audience thatthe film is, “Bonkers, twisty, fun.”and “a wild and crazy ride.”

L. Tomaino

Unmasking ‘Holland’ at The Triplex

The Triplex Cinema in Great Barrington offered a special screening of the movie “Holland” on March 22 with the screenwriter of the film, Andrew Sodroski, on hand after the film to answer questions. He is a resident of Berkshire County.

“Holland” stars Nicole Kidman, Matthew Macfadyen, who plays her husband, and Gael Garcia Bernal, who plays her friend. Before the start of the film, Sodroski warned the audience that it would be a “wild and crazy ride” but also “bonkers, twisty, fun.”

“The whole movie is about what you see and don’t see. The surface versus underneath,” said Sodroski.

This film delves deep below the surface into the ways that darkness exists in the worst possible cases. Anyone viewing the film should be aware that at its core is a serious mental illness and should bear that in mind should they decide to watch.

The film takes place in Holland, Michigan, which Sodroski chose because he wanted a “specific place with a specific subculture.” In Holland, they celebrate their Dutch heritage with a yearly festival complete with Dutch costumes, wooden shoes, traditional Dutch dancing, a parade, windmills, and tulips. Sodroski used this surface for a “technicolor experience. A sort of dreamworld which in a little while is ripped away.”He admitted to being influenced by his admiration of David Lynch’s films.

In the movie’s Holland, “Smooth surfaces matter. When you leave your house, you always look presentable.”

The movie begins with Kidman’s character having lost a pearl earring (calling to mind Dutch painter Vermeer’s “Girl With a Pearl Earring”) and in her search of her perfect house and her husband’s model train shed, she finds indications of his secret life. At first imagining an affair, she finds an even deeper, darker secret.

During the question-and-answer period, Sodrosky explained that he wrote the screenplay soon after film school, thirteen years ago. He said that “Holland” was on the Black List, “a list of all the most popular unproduced screenplays which have been bought but never seen,” for many years. These scripts are passed amid other screenwriters, producers, and directors. They vote for the best and “Holland” topped the list in 2013.

Sodrosky thought this meant “Holland” would soon be developed into a film, but it took years to find financing, a cast, and a director. “Finally,” he said, “they got Nicole Kidman who brought in director Mimi Cave.”

Sodroski was pleased with the finished film. “It is very, very close to the first draft. The visual world is close. It was like a mind meld with Mimi Cave.”He admitted it can be hard to hand the screenplay over to a director. “They take control,” adding that movies are “always a collaboration with the director, writer, studio, and cast.”

In the end, he said, “You do think about the audience and what experience you want them to have. You’re building a roller coaster and what kind of ride you’re going to give them.”

“Holland” can be seen on Amazon Prime starting March 27.

Latest News

Angela Derrico Carabine

SHARON — Angela Derrick Carabine, 74, died May 16, 2025, at Vassar Hospital in Poughkeepsie, New York. She was the wife of Michael Carabine and mother of Caitlin Carabine McLean.

A funeral Mass will be celebrated on June 6 at 11:00 a.m. at Saint Katri (St Bernards Church) Church. Burial will follow at St. Bernards Cemetery. A complete obituary can be found on the website of the Kenny Funeral home kennyfuneralhomes.com.

Revisiting ‘The Killing Fields’ with Sam Waterston

Sam Waterston

Jennifer Almquist

On June 7 at 3 p.m., the Triplex Cinema in Great Barrington will host a benefit screening of “The Killing Fields,” Roland Joffé’s 1984 drama about the Khmer Rouge and the two journalists, Cambodian Dith Pran and New York Times correspondent Sydney Schanberg, whose story carried the weight of a nation’s tragedy.

The film, which earned three Academy Awards and seven nominations — including one for Best Actor for Sam Waterston — will be followed by a rare conversation between Waterston and his longtime collaborator and acclaimed television and theater director Matthew Penn.

Keep ReadingShow less
The art of place: maps by Scott Reinhard

Scott Reinhard, graphic designer, cartographer, former Graphics Editor at the New York Times, took time out from setting up his show “Here, Here, Here, Here- Maps as Art” to explain his process of working.Here he explains one of the “Heres”, the Hunt Library’s location on earth (the orange dot below his hand).

obin Roraback

Map lovers know that as well as providing the vital functions of location and guidance, maps can also be works of art.With an exhibition titled “Here, Here, Here, Here — Maps as Art,” Scott Reinhard, graphic designer and cartographer, shows this to be true. The exhibition opens on June 7 at the David M. Hunt Library at 63 Main St., Falls Village, and will be the first solo exhibition for Reinhard.

Reinhard explained how he came to be a mapmaker. “Mapping as a part of my career was somewhat unexpected.I took an introduction to geographic information systems (GIS), the technological side of mapmaking, when I was in graduate school for graphic design at North Carolina State.GIS opened up a whole new world, new tools, and data as a medium to play with.”

Keep ReadingShow less