The Holdovers Parent Guide

Boarding school: it’s prison for the children of the rich and unpleasant, with the only reprieve coming in the form of Christmas vacation. For Angus (Dominic Sessa), that vacation promises two weeks of idyllic swimming in Saint Kitts…until a last minute phone call from his mother sees him left behind with four other students. To make matters worse, the teacher responsible for supervising them is Mr. Hunham (Paul Giamatti). He’s a hard-nosed autocrat with a specialty in Ancient Civilizations and terrorizing his students, although his prickly personality has also made him profoundly unpopular with other teachers.

Mr. Hunham is determined that the boys won’t fall into lackadaisical degeneracy under his watch. Since the only other staff member onsite is food services manager Mary (Da’Vine Joy Randolph), he expects to have free reign. But whether he believes it or not, Hunham and Angus have a lot to learn from each other this Christmas – and almost none of it has anything to do with ancient civilizations.

I’ve always been a fan of these tightly localized stories, featuring small groups of people forced into prolonged contact. As in real life, this is a recipe for conflict. Unpleasant though it may be in reality, conflict is essential for storytelling in film. Characters have to butt up against one another to illuminate both their similarities and their differences, and cramming them together over a holiday is a great place to start. The Holdovers certainly makes the most of the opportunities afforded, telling a compelling, funny, and strangely heartwarming story about the people left behind.

Set as it is in the early 1970’s, the film contains frequent depictions of smoking, but there’s also a significant amount of drinking going on, and occasional teen marijuana use. Viewers will also be met with a fair bit of cussing, and some brief sexual material. Unsurprisingly, this R-rated coming-of-age drama/comedy is geared mostly at older teens and adults.

For an older audience with a tolerance for profanity, The Holdovers is a genuinely charming film. Not only is it a rare example of a comedy that’s actually funny, it’s a drama with characters you can care about, and a story with a clear idea of where it wants to go. Despite leaning a little over-long in runtime, I don’t think I checked my watch once – a rare occurrence in this job. If you’re undeterred by the content concerns, then I hope you’ll give this movie a chance: it’s more than worth the time it takes.