The most loveable movie of the year. Finally, another true classic Christmas movie that holds up on its own as well. Luckily here, old fashioned does not mean dull and really it hardly means old- Paul Giamatti carries the title role as Paul Hunham in yet another movie about a college professor (trend this year?) who is under appreciated in his work and his skill set. Dominic Sessa plays Angus in his very first movie role shines as one of his students, a lost child whose parents have better things to do on their Christmas then spend time with him and he is able to illicit sympathy from us even though at first he appears to be a spoiled little rich kid. They get stranded together over the Xmas holiday at the boarding school where neither wants to be there, and balancing out the trio is Da'vine Joy Randolph's chef Mary who recently lost her son in the army and definitely still has some rage about that.
So they all riff off each other and help each other on a unplanned trip to Boston, but Alexander Payne directs it as someone who really knows how to do reveals about characters at the right time, and here he has created just about a perfect script- an original story at that. The Holdovers is a movie that surprised me and even if you know where its going, it is a pitch perfect story where all the right things fall into place. For a movie with three great stand out acting performances, it also has great background characters- think about the group of classmates Sessa has at the beginning and how they relate to each other- they are not really 'friends' but people stuck together in a boarding school class. Think about all of the teachers, including the one Paul obviously has a crush on and how that scenario plays it self out. I loved this movie the more I thought about it, and despite the familiar subject matter I do think it is actually Alexander Payne's best movie, screenplay, and best acted especially by Giamatti (who I hope wins the OSCAR.
So they all riff off each other and help each other on a unplanned trip to Boston, but Alexander Payne directs it as someone who really knows how to do reveals about characters at the right time, and here he has created just about a perfect script- an original story at that. The Holdovers is a movie that surprised me and even if you know where its going, it is a pitch perfect story where all the right things fall into place. For a movie with three great stand out acting performances, it also has great background characters- think about the group of classmates Sessa has at the beginning and how they relate to each other- they are not really 'friends' but people stuck together in a boarding school class. Think about all of the teachers, including the one Paul obviously has a crush on and how that scenario plays it self out. I loved this movie the more I thought about it, and despite the familiar subject matter I do think it is actually Alexander Payne's best movie, screenplay, and best acted especially by Giamatti (who I hope wins the OSCAR.