The Holdovers

At first glance, The Holdovers is a very unassuming film, where simplicity is beauty. Despite the rather straightforward plot, it managed to really win me over, both on the dramatic and the comedy level. Even though Alexander Payne's film deals with serious and still very topical issues, they are presented in an incredibly relatable way that leaves you feeling good. That said, The Holdovers wouldn't be what it is if it wasn’t for the convincing performances of the central trio of "ordinary" people brought together by fate and their life traumas. The icing on the cake is the authentic, "vintage" style of the image, it makes you feel you are watching a fifty-year old film. (03/07/2024)

And the prize for the year's best acting trio goes to ... the chef, Paul Giamatti and his student. Alexander Payne is unique. He always picks a serious subject and wraps it in subtle and sometimes biting humor, and throws in an interesting point on top. The main thing here is how it is possible to humanise a grumpy and strict professor into an understanding and sensitive being without smacking of some cheap scriptwriting crutch. Giamatti absolutely shines in his role, reminiscent of Payne's best film to date, Sideways. There, Giamatti lived only for wine and everything related to it and women were rather on the fringes of his interests, here he lives only for his ancient Greece, for ancient history and women are again on the sidelines for him. Thanks his skill as an actor and his physiognomy, no one would be more suited to the role than the slightly chubby Paul – an Oscar nomination probably won't jingle from this, but it certainly should. And it's not just Paul, but the captain is back in full force after the botched Downsizing, proving why he's a star of independent filmmaking. Payne gently slides between the slightly depressing moods and the feel-good ones, and even though it ends the way it does, you get an awfully good feeling from it all. (01/01/2024)

Feel good, yet feel sad. Alexander Payne delivers one of the best films of the year, and he only needed relatively little to do so: a sensitively written script and some good actors. Ordinary, yet beautiful. I like big, unique and original concepts in movies, but sometimes "a little" is more than "a lot". This conniving little man ambushed me and managed to win me over. (12/23/2023)

Alexander Payne knows how to make dramas that are humanly warm one moment and uncomfortably acerbic a few moments later. Few filmmakers are as good at it as him, and I'm glad he reminded us of that with The Holdovers. Paul Giamatti is excellent, as are his two less famous colleagues, both of whom we hope to hear from in the future. There's some excellent work with the gradual reveal of the characters and the fact that everyone carries their past, trauma and insecurities within them and it takes a lot of work to start talking about them or even confronting them. I definitely appreciate that Payne doesn't push the envelope in this regard and is rather restrained in working with emotions, not trying to make the characters laugh, move or bare their innermost selves at all costs. He just follows the three lost souls left to fend for themselves at Christmas. The seventies feel (not just the setting) is beautiful too, and overall it's very nice to watch. Whether you take it as a bittersweet pice or a gritty drama about how everyone just has to deal with certain things on their own, it's still not a bad thing to have someone by your side. (02/20/2024)

Two hard heads who at first give each other absolutely nothing, but then itheir inner demons start to bring them together. Paul Giamatti and Dominic Sessa are a great central pairing who bring nothing new to the ring, but the confidence with which Alexander Payne leads them in a 1970s garb is impressive. Anyone who knows me a bit will suspect that I have a soft spot for this schoolboy micro-genre. Dead Poets Society, Scent of a Woman and Good Will Hunting are still the benchmarks of the best bedtime stories for me. The Holdovers probably doesn’t surpass the aforementioned except for the never-ending cadence of antique wisecracks. But just the fact that I can recommend it alongside those classics as a younger Christmas sibling in 2023 makes me immensely happy. (10/31/2023)