Sprekend Nederland

During a cold winter month, John Appel went to various meetings all over the country and filmed speeches by experienced and less experienced speakers. For example, he found a general addressing his troops before going on a mission to Afghanistan, a civil servant of the registry office who is barely able to suppress her tears, a Trades Union Congress leader with a whistle at a meeting of infuriated members, a sloshed rugby player, a naturalised Uruguayan among the new communists of the NCPN, a grieving daughter at her mother's funeral and a nervous son holding up a mirror to his parents who are celebrating a jubilee. Thanks to Appel's partiality for genuine people and telling moments, Sprekend Nederland has become a wintry portrait in fourteen speeches that makes you laugh heartily and sometimes reduces you to concerned silence, while presenting a view of the Netherlands.