Het nieuwe Rijksmuseum

In the early 2000s, then Rijksmuseum director Ronald de Leeuw uses his unbridled energy to launch an ambitious alteration, which should usher in the museum into the 21st century. His associates dedicate themselves with equal fervour to the metamorphosis, but beyond the museum walls consensus is far off. Local and national politics, buildings aesthetics committees, compromises, tendering problems and a militant Cyclist Federation thwart several plans, causing huge delays. What should have been a glorious re-opening in 2008 deteriorates into a succession of crushed ambitions and meeting-weary staff members, as patiently registered by filmmaker Oeke Hoogendijk. From 2005 to 2008, she filmed everything that happened - and did not happen. Hoogendijk presents beautiful portraits of the involved curators, the master builder, the restorers and the Spanish architects, who repeatedly have to swallow their pride. In the process, the documentary not only provides an illuminating glimpse of a historically miscarried alteration, but also of the Dutch culture of compromises.