Now Something is Slowly Changing review – intermittently fascinating Dutch self-help documentary

The world of self-help comes under coldly elegant scrutiny in Dutch documentary Now Something is Slowly Changing, a look at the various kinds of personal and team-building coaching courses offered in the Netherlands that is very happy to let you draw your own conclusions. Made up of static camera tableaux that almost look like Roy Andersson shots, it’s an intermittently funny and fascinating film about an industry that does aid people but can also look like an absurd grift.

Bouncing between various courses – from anger management for young kids to confidence therapy involving walking a horse to roleplay sessions for cops – director Menna Laura Meijer doesn’t use any sort of contextualising narration or present any open judgements. It all adds up to a slightly surreal tone, aided by the static and often intriguing compositions, one that does draw your interest but also wears out its welcome a bit before the credits roll.

The one-on-ones are rarely as interesting as the group sessions, a greater variety of personalities in the room breathing additional life into what can be a pretty sterile film. One corporate session is particularly enjoyable, the attendees clearly enjoying a day away from the office regardless of the outcome, while a more abstract emotional therapy course hits genuinely bizarre notes, the discomfort of some of the participants flowing off the screen.

While it hardly provides much in the way of great thrills or deep insights (the post-session effects on the participants is never explored), Now Something is Slowly Changing is an interesting slice of a very particular kind of middle-class life. Whether you swear by self-help or think the whole discipline is ridiculous, the amusingly wide breadth of types of courses here means at least a few of the scenes will grip you.

Now Something is Slowly Changing is streaming on True Story from 30 December.