Going Dutch: the Polder Model

Screenwriter Thessa Mooij offers an insight into the Dutch film industry.

I’m a Dutch screenwriter living in Brooklyn, but working in in the government-subsidized Dutch film industry. That doesn’t make it any less of a shark pool, but since the bureaucrats who run the place are accountable to parliament, at least you know which shark is chomping on your leg.

The Dutch film industry has an extremely dense infrastructure. Thanks to centuries of Calvinism and decades of socialism, Holland likes to think it takes care of its citizens. Film and public broadcasters exist thanks to numerous government-infused funds. Screenwriters in Holland benefit from a great number of organisations, competitions, workshops, funds and other government-sponsored initiatives. From a business point of view this is a good thing, but on the creative side, it also can lead a lack of spontaneity, or worse, complacency.

Add to that the small size of our country and its equally small horizon and you have what Dutch politicos like to call the 'Polder Model'. This system dictates agreement by committee. It thrives on endless meetings in which people try to agree on agreeing. It also means that the Dutch tend to mistrust big gestures, bold moves and a (sometimes) healthy dose of headbutting.

The Dutch Polder Model is the complete opposite of my current habitat of Brooklyn, where the Free Market reigns Supreme. The typical New York indie film gets made because the producer hunted down a junior Wall Street guy who wants to blow his bonus on a movie. This is often followed by a scramble to rush the script to screen, or frighteningly enough, a rush to get a script in the first place.

Having lived in London before moving to Brooklyn, all the while receiving Dutch government grants regardless of my address, I became aware of the relative cushiness of the Dutch system. While the British Film Council seems to move in mysterious ways, the Dutch Film Fund has clear deadlines for script submissions and publishes its decisions every three months. You can even appeal to their decisions or ask for a written explanation.

Some Dutch screenwriters moan about the lengthy, invasive development process in Holland. But unlike the American system where filmmakers will shoot anything with words on paper as soon as the money is in the bank, the Dutch system does seem to work as a form of quality control.

Funds and public broadcasters read and comment on your work. These are mostly professionals and if they suggest changes that don't feel right, they are usually pointing at a weak spot in your script that needs fixing anyway. I have been in situations where I felt the people across the table from me shied away from ambitious story lines or bold stylistic choices, but so far it hasn't stopped them from giving me money.

At the Dutch Film Fund, a feature writer can knock on three different doors. In one case, they need to have a producer attached to the project who will then apply for development money from the feature committee made up of film professionals (filmmakers and producers are excluded because of their presumed closer ties to other creatives). This committee has the power to fund a film all the way to postproduction. Their decisions and comments are fairly mainstream, sometimes even bland and predictable, as you can expect from a ruling by committee. But there is less of a risk of favouritism here.

Another way of getting your script funded is by sending it to one of the two intendants. These commissioning editors have the power to back the development - but not the production - of any script with or without a producer attached. One has been appointed for mainstream projects, the other for less accessible arthouse productions.

I had my first script funded by the intendant for commercial films, Jean van de Velde, one of Holland's most successful screenwriters. An experienced professional with integrity, he had no hidden agenda. We went from synopsis to treatment to first draft and my meetings with him were extremely useful; it was like having my own private script doctor. I still feel privileged that just by sending in a synopsis of my very first script, I received a decent amount of money to write a full draft. No need to get in with the 'hot' producer du jour or to schmooze at parties.

My other experiences, with the committee and the intendant for arthouse films were less straightforward because the script in question was an arty thriller in the vein of Diva. The committee gave me funding to write a treatment, but then decided it was too arty. The arthouse intendant commissioned a first draft, but then scolded me for having written a well-structured thriller where all the loose ends are neatly tied up in the end. Boring, boring, boring. If I had fed my protagonist snippets of avant-garde poetry instead of lines that actually move the plot along, I might still be in business with him.

Legal hang-ups

Two Dutch institutions and a Danish one have been instrumental in turning me into a professional screenwriter. One of them is the Dutch screenwriter's guild (Netwerk Scenarioschrijvers) of which I was a co-founder in 1990. I was way too young (23) and although I wanted to be a screenwriter, I had no stories to tell. Working on the Netwerk's magazine set me on a ten-year long detour into journalism.

When a story did announce itself to me four years ago, I took it to the Amsterdam-based Binger Institute, whose teaching staff (moonlighting from the University of Southern California) imparted on me the golden rule of 'show, not tell.'

With the screenwriting basics under my belt, I signed up for the EU-funded North-By-Northwest programme, the fee for which was generously paid for me by the Dutch Film Fund. There the transition from journalist to screenwriter was completed, thanks to L.A.-based tutor Beth Serlin.

The Netwerk Scenarioschrijvers has since developed into an actual union with 210 members, which is estimated to cover 80 percent of all Dutch screenwriters. The Netwerk is part of the larger Dutch writers' guild (Vereniging van Schrijvers en Letterkundigen) and it offers career guidance, moral support and legal advice. It has negotiated a standard contract with the public broadcasters to which every deal with any screenwriter is subject. Individual legal representation is made possible through an affiliated entertainment lawyer who works for union members at affordable rates.

According to the Netwerk's director Willemiek Seligmann, "the biggest hang-ups of our members seem to be legal matters regarding the rights and especially residual rights of drama commissioned by public broadcasters and independent producers. I usually don't get any complaints about commercial TV producers, but that's because writers assume they are not going to get a great deal from them anyway.

“We did some research into the amount of drama being commissioned by ‘pubcasters’ and it's actually declining by 5% per year. There seems to be even less room for a high quality auteur type of drama. Until recently most Dutch screenwriters made a living writing for public TV. Now they also write for commercial stations, they write books or they teach. The pubcasters are at a turning point now that the government seems to be very critical of them copying commercial concepts such as reality shows and soap operas at the tax payer's expense. They say they want to make more quality drama too, make it will be interesting to see whether their drama production is really going to move away from those commercial formats."

The Binger Institute offers an intense, English-language programme for writers from all over the world. Director Dick Willemsen likes to think of Binger as "an international monastery on one of Amsterdam's busiest streets. Not many people get the chance in their professional lives to talk about their work with such intensity and in such a safe environment. Usually there's only one person who reads your work, the film producer or the TV script editor, and they say either yes or no. Then the script gets a life of its own because it becomes a collective product." 

A former commissioning editor for TV, Willemsen notes that, generally speaking, Dutch screenwriters tend to be unclear about the conflicts in their stories. "It may have something to do with the way that Dutch people in general try to evade conflict. Some of the scripts I deal with are highly detailed, but quite ambiguous about the dramatic arc. The characters are not fleshed out; they don't lead a life of their own yet. If you know exactly what your main character would say or do, you can better manipulate them to heighten the conflict." Could it be that the Polder Model of always trying to agree to agree is at work here?

Dutch Calvinism created a country with a strong work ethic where the homeless, and even screenwriters, get taken care of. I can't really say that about Brooklyn, even though the borough's official motto is the 17th century message of its Dutch founding fathers: 'Eendraght Maekt Maght', meaning 'there is power in unity'. Obviously, the Polder Model never caught on in the land of the Free. 

Me, I like to stick with a huge billboard on the Brooklyn Queens Expressway. It has a message from borough president Marty Markowitz: "Thinking of leaving Brooklyn? Ah… Fuggedaboutit!."

Photo caption: Former Dutch Film Fund intendant Jean van de Velde conducts a workshop at the Binger institute. Photo by Jean van Lingen.

This article first appeared in the Guild's magazine, UK Writer (Summer 2005).