The Holdovers

133 min | 11 Jan 2024

Mature themes and coarse language

Nobody likes teacher Paul Hunham (Giamatti) -- not his students, not his fellow faculty, not the headmaster, who all find his pomposity and rigidity exasperating.

Nobody likes teacher Paul Hunham (Giamatti) -- not his students, not his fellow faculty, not the headmaster, who all find his pomposity and rigidity exasperating. With no family and nowhere to go over Christmas holiday in 1970, Paul remains at school to supervise students unable to journey home. After a few days, only one student holdover remains -- a trouble-making 15-year-old named Angus, a good student whose bad behavior always threatens to get him expelled. Joining Paul and Angus is head cook Mary (Randolph)-an African American woman who caters to sons of privilege and whose own son was recently lost in Vietnam. These three very different shipwrecked people form an unlikely Christmas family sharing comic misadventures during two very snowy weeks in New England. The real journey is how they help one another understand that they are not beholden to their past-they can choose their own futures.

Director
Alexander Payne
Cast
Paul Giamatti, Da'Vine Joy Randolph, Dominic Sessa
Genre
Comedy, Drama
Rating
M (Mature themes and coarse language)
Release Date
11 January 2024
Runtime
133 min