The Holdovers
A curmudgeonly instructor at a New England prep school is forced to remain on campus during Christmas break to babysit the handful of students with nowhere to go. Eventually, he forms an unlikely bond with one of them — a damaged, brainy troublemaker — and with the school’s head cook, who has just lost a son in Vietnam.
- Released: 2023-11-10
- Runtime: 133 minutes
- Genre: Comedy, Drama
- Stars: Da'Vine Joy Randolph, Carrie Preston, Gillian Vigman, Dustin Tucker, Bill Mootos, Paul Giamatti, Dan Aid, Colleen Clinton, Brady Hepner, Jim Kaplan, Michael Provost, Andrew Garman, Naheem Garcia, Stephen Thorne, Tate Donovan, Alexander Cook, Liz Bishop, Cole Tristan Murphy, Will Sussbauer, Carter Shimp
- Director: Alexander Payne
Comments
- jon_pratt12345 - 23 June 2024
An instant Christmas classic
The Holdovers is an instant classic. Watching it for the first time, feels like watching an old favourite Christmas film. Crafting such a vivid sense of nostalgia and warmth. I believe it will become a go-to Christmas fixture for many years to come.
A troubled student, a pompous teacher and mourning cook, are forced to spend Christmas together at their prestigious school. A heart-warming and universally relatable story unfolds between the three as they learn from each other and tackle their own set of demons.
The Holdovers manages to have something for everyone; relatable to those just finding their place in the world as much as it is for the cynics who have seen it all. Occasionally edgy, but ultimately family-friendly. The film jumps effortlessly from laugh-out-loud comedy, to moving moments of tragedy and triumph for the characters.
The performances are superb. Dominic Sessa plays the student with a perfect balance as both old-before-his time and a genuinely believable teenager, doing stupid things. Giamatti as the teacher, plays to-type as a misanthropic intellectual elitist. Da'Vine Joy Randolph brings humanity and warmth, but skilfully avoids cliché.
Overall The Holdovers is a joyful and optimistic film that I hope win status as an all time Christmas great. - wnel47 - 7 June 2024
Real People with Real Superpowers
In a age of "Throwaway Movies", and "Superhero Movies" that just blend together. And 100 million dollar Netflix Junk (Im talking to you Zack Snyder).
Comes a little movie about "People". Real People, people with not perfect lives. A movie that shows you Love can grow, like a Flower out Concrete. The People in this Movie Lives were thrown together and they grew to care and respect each other. It also shows that, you may not know what a person is going through or how they got to a point in their lives. I think we need more movies like this. But the problem is people will not got to the movie theater to see this kind of film. But I think Amazon is the perfect vehicle for these type of films. And one last thing we need to give "Paul Giamatti" his Flowers...now.
