I love Alexander Payne movies. I love Christmas movies. I love throwbacks. So, I was in the bag for "The Holdovers" pretty much from frame one. There's a treacly, maudlin version of this film that would have made for easy holiday programming, but whatever "The Holdovers" is, it's not easy in any sense, and thus has a greater chance of being a lasting classic. There's certainly sentiment in the movie, enough that I'm comfortable calling this the most crowd-pleasing film of Payne's career, but it's a character drama at its core, and character drama of a kind that's been out of style for decades.
It's 1970, and the winter holiday season at Barton Academy, a prestigious New England boarding school near Boston. A group of boys, the "holdovers," have nowhere to go during the break, and are stuck at Barton under the watch of Paul Hunham (Paul Giamatti), the despised classics teacher who seems to enjoy antagonizing his students. The only other staff member around for the duration is the head of the cafeteria, Mary (Da'Vine Joy Randolph), who stays to cook for them, though others like the custodian Danny (Naheem Garcia) and another teacher, Lydia Crane (Carrie Preston), make appearances. The two week break is very eventful, and Hunham ends up befriending one of his charges, the troubled Angus Tully (Dominic Sessa).
"The Holdovers" starts straight off with the '70s version of the Universal Pictures logo, an ancient R-rating notice, and even a Focus Features logo card done up in 70s graphics. We're going back to the era of "The Graduate" and "Goodbye, Columbus," and Payne makes sure we're very aware of this. The pace of the film is slow and thoughtful. The comedy is wry and observational. We learn about the characters gradually, their layers peeling away bit by bit. We learn that Mary's son has recently died and she isn't ready to spend time with family yet. We learn that Hunham rarely leaves the school, and prefers being alone. We learn that Tully's mother has recently gotten remarried. Lots of little things are revealed, and it takes time for the dots to connect, but it's so satisfying when they do.
There are so few films that are comfortable with this kind of storytelling anymore, where you have scenes of characters just existing in the frame together, doing very little for minutes at a time. What's more, Payne keeps finding ways to undercut the big dramatic moments, keeping the proceedings more realistic and relatable. When someone has a drunken outburst, when we realize a character lied, and when we realize the girl already has a boyfriend - the other characters' reactions are conciliatory, politely sympathetic, or just kept private. And yet we feel them just the same. "The Holdovers" is a wonderfully empathetic film, one that takes its time and earns its emotional payoffs. It might seem odd to call this a Christmas film, but it's a Christmas film for all those people who don't have people to share the season with, or aren't in the right headspace for celebration, but could still use some comfort and joy.
Hunham is a ridiculous character, with his gleeful misanthropy, his lazy eye, and his puffed up self-importance hiding so much insecurity underneath. It's thanks to Paul Giamatti that he's not only watchable, but sympathetic and redeemable by the end of the picture. Dominic Sessa is a newcomer, who does a great job of being both an annoying little smartass and a deeply wounded kid in need of saving. Watching him spar with Giamatti is irresistable. However, Da'Vine Joy Randolph handily blows them both off the screen every time she appears. Mary is the character with the rawest pain, and even when I knew the hurt was coming, it still caught me off guard in the best way. May the people who give awards out to movies kindly pay some attention.
I don't think that I'm going to like any movie from 2023 more than I like "The Holdovers." Alexander Payne has more or less made my ideal Christmas movie - no Santa or Jesus in sight, but a little black humor, plenty of bittersweet kvetching about the season, some socially conscious nostalgia, and a gigantic heart. I'm sure I'll be revisiting it on many imperfect holidays to come.
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