The Holdovers features three central characters who are all dealing with the repercussions of their pasts. The film gives us an interesting take on how the past continues to affect us, how it still influences our behaviors whether or not we are aware of its power over us. The three main characters are all stranded at a Northeastern prep school called Baron Academy over the winter break, and they form an odd but emotionally compelling combo as they learn about each other and how to interact with each other. It’s intriguing that the filmmakers have chosen as one of their central characters a teacher of Western Civilization, the study of the past, since so much of this film is truly about uncovering and confronting the past.
The title refers to the prep school students whose parents leave them behind at Christmas time. It’s 1970, and Angus Tully (well played by Dominic Sessa) has a mother who would rather go on a honeymoon with her new husband instead of bringing her son home for Christmas or taking him with her. He and four other students are held back at the campus, and their much-hated classics/history teacher, Paul “Walleye” Hunham (Oscar nominee Paul Giamatti), is given the unenviable job of overseeing their safety during the break. Mary Lamb (Oscar winner Da’Vine Joy Randolph) has the thankless task of cooking for the holdovers.
Hunham makes the students, all males (as if that needed to be said about a private school back in the 1970s), get up early and exercise. He also forces them to study during what they hoped would be a time to play around and have fun. The film does make a nod to the diversity that was beginning to appear in these kinds of prestigious schools; one of the kids is Korean, and another is a long-haired Mormon football player. However, the worst of the guys is Teddy Kountze (Brady Hepner), who acts like a jerk to everyone, including the younger boys who are feeling very homesick. Angus is more sympathetic to them, despite his attempts to appear tough in the face of the sadness of being abandoned by his mother. When the rich father of one of the boys shows up in a helicopter to take everyone on a ski trip, only Angus is unable to reach his mother for permission, so he gets stuck with Hunham and Lamb.
When the remaining three people start watching television together and eating together, they also start talking to each other, and we learn some rather surprising details about their lives. Each of them is a bit of a misfit, and each of them has issues. Giamatti’s Hunham, for example, has a strange disorder that makes his body smell… well… fishier as the day progresses. He also failed the son of a prominent donor to the academy, which is the reason for why he was given the job of supervising the holdovers. Mary has lost her son Curtis, who was killed in Vietnam shortly after graduating from Barton, and she still hasn’t recovered from his death.
And then there’s Angus, who has been telling everyone that his father has passed away. The truth is that he’s been confined to a mental institution, and Angus desperately wants to see him again. He feels like his mother has abandoned both himself and his father, and during an alleged educational “field trip” to Boston, he has a very sad reunion with his dad. He also dislocates his shoulder during an act of defiance against Hunham’s attempts to control his behavior, but this actually winds up helping the two men bond over their shared inability to make friends. Neither one of them feels particularly well-liked, and that serves as a way for them to start liking each other.
Each of the three main characters has possibilities. It does seem like the school secretary played by Carrie Preston might like Bunham, but perhaps she’s just feeling sorry for him. (We do find out as the film progresses.) Angus quickly finds the secretary’s niece interesting, but she might just be a bit of a fling once she finds out about his family. Mary has an admirer in the school’s janitor, but she initially seems too wrapped up in her grief to give him the attention that he (and she) deserves. All three of them seem capable of love (or whatever approximation of love you want to consider), but they’re not ready for it yet, it seems.
The Holdovers has its moments of levity. I wouldn’t want to give the impression that the entire film is so melancholy. The ending, in particular, allows Hunham to have a moment of both closure and delight after he’s fired from his job. No, we don’t know what is going to happen to him next, but he’s feeling a bit of joy at his ability to find a way to be victorious after all. For someone who has been beaten down by life several times, it’s a fun moment. Maybe he’s going to write that book he always claimed he would, or maybe he’ll be able to find a teaching job somewhere else. Who knows? We’re not left with closure for the other main characters either although Mary seems to be more adjusted to her son’s death and Angus feels now that he is not destined to be like his father.
I’m surprised that only Giamatti and Randolph got much major awards attention for their acting. They are certainly deserving, but Sessa’s performance as Angus is a delicate balance of youthful anger and naivete mixed with a healthy does of underlying sadness. He was nominated and did win a couple of critics’ awards, but he’s certainly as good as many of the men nominated for Best Supporting Actor. The film also didn’t get much attention for its production design or costumes, but it does a marvelous job of evoking the time period in which it is set. It’s not always easy to capture the feel of that transitional moment from the 1960s to the 1970s, but The Holdovers is able to do it well.
When you watch a film like this, you have to consider what the Academy voters might have noted that led to it being nominated for the award for Best Motion Picture. It’s likely that its tale of failed ambitions or lost dreams might resonate with many of the people in the entertainment industry. Perhaps their lives might not have turned out quite as they had expected or even wanted. Maybe, though, it’s the way that the three central characters are portrayed, not just by the actors themselves but by the overall script. There’s a great deal of sympathy here for those who feel like outsiders, who feel like everyone else has their life in order, but who also think that they’re never going to have friends or people they can rely on. If a student with depression, an alcoholic teacher, and a grieving cafeteria supervisor can become what constitutes a surrogate family, even if it’s only for a few weeks, maybe the world is more filled with hope than we might initially imagine.
Oscar Win: Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role (Da’Vine Joy Randolph)
Other
Oscar Nominations:
Best Motion Picture of the Year, Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role
(Paul Giamatti), Best Original Screenplay, and Best Achievement in Film Editing
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