Dracula
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Post by Dracula on Oct 25, 2023 19:56:33 GMT -5
The Holdovers(10/19/2023)  Are boarding schools still a thing? For that matter were they ever as much of “a thing” as the literature and media of the past suggests they were? They must exist to some extent (a quick google search shows that about 35,000 students attend one each year in the United States) but I certainly don’t know anyone who was sent to one and the very act of doing so would seem to be in contradiction to the helicopter parenting mentality of today’s upper class. I couldn’t find many historical statistics about the institutions but they seemed to be all over the place in books and movies set before roughly the 90s, in part because books and movies tend to be written by the kind of wealthy people who would have been sent to them. “The Catcher in the Rye” is set at one of these blue blood boarding schools, so is “A Separate Peace,” and so are movies like Dead Poet’s Society, Scent of a Woman, and School Ties. Now? Not so much, at least not outside of period pieces and intentional anachronisms like Rushmore. There seems to be something rather cold about these schools, places filled with kids whose parents care so little about them that they are willing to part with them for long periods of time just to slightly improve their chances of getting into Harvard. It’s hard to imagine that they can’t find similarly swanky schools within commuting distances to home. That exact loneliness is at the core of the new Alexander Payne directed film The Holdovers, which looks at the loneliest of all the students at one of these schools.
The film is set in late 1970 at an elite prep school called Barton Academy and follows an aging antiquities professor there named Paul Hunham (Paul Giamatti) who embodies all the typical academic stereotypes like tweed jackets, pipe smoking, and a torettes like interest in quoting Latin proverbs. He’s infamous among his students for being an uncompromising taskmaster and harsh grader and he’s also in the doghouse with the school’s principal after he gave an “F” to the son of one of the school’s powerful donors. That particular incident is believed to be why he was selected, out of turn, to be the teacher required to stay behind over the winter break to chaperone the five “holdover” students who for various reasons cannot return home for Christmas and must remain at the school while everyone else is gone. Among those students is Angus Tully (Dominic Sessa), a smart but rebellious young man who’s told at the last minute that he won’t be coming home because his mother and stepfather are going to go on their honeymoon instead of having a family gathering. Also staying behind is a school lunch lady named Mary Lamb (Da'Vine Joy Randolph) whose mourning the death of her son in Vietnam and is something of a friend to Hunham.
The Holdovers is not exactly a “unique” film. As I said at the outset the elite prep school is kind of a stock location for movies and we’ve certainly seen these “tough professor has his heart warmed” movies as well. It’s not very hard to guess from the setup where things are going in this movie and in broad strokes it indeed doesn’t have a ton of surprises in store. However, the movie’s execution of all this is quite solid. Firstly the movie makes the canny choice to make Paul Hunham something of an outsider to this world of the elite. It’s revealed at a certain point that Hunham actually came from a difficult background and got his education on scholarship. With this in mind a lot of his excessive professorial affect feels like something of a mask he wears to fit in and his harsh grading and disciplinarian tendencies seem to be rooted in a sort of resentment of his over-privileged students. This is what ultimately allows him to make a connection both with Mary Lamb out of a common-ish background but also with Angus Tully given his general disaffection and disinterest with the wealthy world of his stepfather. That goes a long way toward making the audience relate to this guy, but the film does not let him off the hook entirely either. The guy is very much of a piece with another over-educated alcoholic played by Paul Giamatti in an Alexander Payne movie: Miles Raymond from Sideways. Like Miles, Hunham is a guy who has kind of built himself a trap of isolation through snobbery and resentment and the movie is in many ways about him learning to get out of his bubble.
The Holdovers is rather in keeping with Alexander Payne’s filmmaking more generally in that it’s this really well thought out dramedy with a focus on character and setting. In this sense it’s a real return to form from his 2017 environmental satire Downsizing, which generally wasn’t very well received and I also probably prefer it to his 2013 effort Nebraska, which was a lot drier than this was. I wouldn’t exactly recommend The Holdovers as some totally hilarious comedy or anything but it does have a witty screenplay by a writer named David Hemingson and does go for laugh lines in several places. It’s probably Payne’s funniest movie since Sideways, though I wouldn’t say it hits that movie’s highs by any means and it’s a bit more of a stock narrative than some of Payne’s more adventurous early movies like Election. Payne is kind of a strange director to really get to the heart of because he’s definitely an auteur but it’s not really because of his visual style so much as his sensibility. He doesn’t even write all of his own movies but all of them feel like they’re coming from the same mind and he isn’t as prolific as most similar character/comedy focused auteurs either if only because he really seems to take his time and really lock down the character dynamics in his movies. This is his most crowd pleasing work in a while and it’s a movie I feel like I’m going to be pretty safely able to recommend come this upcoming award season though it maybe lacks a certain innovative edge to really place it among the year’s absolute best work. **** out of Five |
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PhantomKnight
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Post by PhantomKnight on Dec 9, 2023 16:50:17 GMT -5
It's good to have you back, Alexander Payne. After his previous film, Downsizing, turned out to be an unusual miscalculation for the director, The Holdovers very much feels like a return to form for the kind of character-focused narratives he excels at. And my God, what fascinating characters the ones in The Holdovers are. It's not so much that the story of the film itself breaks new ground or anything, but rather it's exceptionally well-told by someone who knows what they're doing. Also, neither does the film's overt approach to/recreation of a 70's-style aesthetic and filmmaking feel only like window dressing. It feels like a true homage in ways that demonstrate a clear understanding of what made those kinds of movies tick, while making one that works within those same trappings. The way the plot unfolds feels very natural -- and in true Alexander Payne fashion, oftentimes in ways that can be emotionally rough yet also sharply witty and funny. The script by David Hemingson taps into emotional honesties that, again, may not be anything new, but are delivered in very touching fashion, aided in no small part by the three main cast members, all of whom play their parts with aplomb. Paul Giamatti, Da'Vine Joy Randolph and Dominic Sessa all create characters that feel real and vulnerable and difficult and believable on their own, but combined together, I could have just watched them for days. The movie deals with the idea that sharing the most vulnerable parts of yourself can open you up more than you thought possible, and as I said before, it all comes down to how it's played, which is beautifully. Some may call this movie a downer in some respects, but I think it's ultimately uplifting. There's plenty of comedy throughout this movie, but it's all balanced out with some legitimately hard-hitting drama, and where the movie ends up feels appropriately bittersweet and also subtly hopeful. The Holdovers is heartfelt, old-fashioned, understated and one of the best movies of the year.
****/****
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Neverending
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Post by Neverending on Jan 27, 2024 0:18:05 GMT -5
Are boarding schools still a thing? For that matter were they ever as much of “a thing” as the literature and media of the past suggests they were? They must exist to some extent (a quick google search shows that about 35,000 students attend one each year in the United States) but I certainly don’t know anyone who was sent to one and the very act of doing so would seem to be in contradiction to the helicopter parenting mentality of today’s upper class. I couldn’t find many historical statistics about the institutions but they seemed to be all over the place in books and movies set before roughly the 90s, in part because books and movies tend to be written by the kind of wealthy people who would have been sent to them. New Englander Seth MacFarlane went to boarding school. That might answer your question as to the type of folks that went to boarding school. |
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IanTheCool
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Post by IanTheCool on Jan 27, 2024 10:15:41 GMT -5
The Holdovers started off as an enjoyable drama about a crotchety teacher at a private boys school and the students who are stuck with him during Christmas break. But, in true Alexander Payne fashion, it draws you in more and more. And gradually you begin to realize just how emotionally invested you've become.
9/10
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