The village itself saw him on Saturday evening 13 April, Monday evening it was the turn of the rest of the Netherlands. The documentary ‘Holwerd aan Zee’ by filmmaker Kees Vlaanderen was shown on Monday 15 April at 20:55 at NPO2.
It was still missing from the victory march of the four initiators of Holwerd aan Zee: a documentary on national television, broadcast primetime. Tonight the planners can tick that box as well.
Degradation
The film by Kees Vlaanderen tells the story, now well known in Friesland, of four Holwerders who refuse to accept the loss of their village. They came up with a plan to rebuild the mound village, just like in the old days, by the sea.
Sloshing
If that succeeds, the thought is, Holwerd will no longer be ‘the most passed village’. Because Holwerd, that’s still mainly the boat to Ameland. No, Holwerd aan Zee succeeds, then the sea will sloshing against the village center and tourists will find the village again. An opportunity to turn the tide for the village, it also sounds in the documentary.
Megaplan
Anyone who has followed the reports on the tourist-ecological megaplan in recent years will find little or no news in the film. Then there are always the beautiful images of Holwerd, village life, the Wadden Sea and the Wadden Sea. Without a doubt the most beautiful scene is the one of condolence in the supermarket, between the packets of Knorr Worldcourses and pots of Hak-grown vegetables.
The film is also an ode to daring to think big, having heart for your surroundings and a middle finger to all fatalistic shrink-thinkers who think that soon only a weak extract of the original plans will remain. Or that it won’t even take place at all.
Millions
Holwerd aan Zee’ follows the rather impressive triumphal march of the four initiators from Wetterskip to the municipality to the province to Brussels. One organisation after another is enthusiastic, although for a long time it remains unclear who is going to pay the price. Eventually, the province (10 million) and the Postcode Lottery (15 million) will be able to make the transition.
Did you see the gentlemen strolling along the muddy dike one moment, but in the next shot they are in the splendour of Amsterdam’s Carré theatre face to face with Humberto Tan, Nicolette van Dam and Pieter Winsemius. All three of them wrap around their fingers effortlessly, by the way. (source: www.lc.nl)
