Exquisite, five-star movie can’t be missed

Think about the teacher you had that everyone hated.

They were probably strict, uncompromising and more than a little mean. And it wasn’t just the kids who didn’t like them, you could tell they weren’t popular with the rest of the faculty as well.

That’s Paul Hunham (Paul Giamatti), a crusty and curmudgeon ancient civilisations teacher at the snow-covered New England boarding school in the 1970-set film The Holdovers. Paul is dedicated to teaching, but he has no patience for the students, referring to them as “reprobates”, “hormonal vulgarians” and “fetid layabouts”.

He’s a misanthrope, his wounds born out of what he perceives as a life that has been chipped away by the unfair advantages the privileged have over him. He’s on the nose with the headmaster after Paul refused to pass a failing student whose parents were big donors to the school.

When Christmas rolls around, Paul draws the short straw and is assigned to supervise the students who can’t go home for Christmas. One of them is Angus (Dominic Sessa), an unpopular kid whose mother decides at the last moment that she’s going on a honeymoon with her new husband instead of the Caribbean getaway she promised him.

Also stuck at the school is cafeteria manager Mary (Da’Vine Joy Randolph), who is facing her first Christmas without her son, a former student who has been killed in the Vietnam War.

The plea to Paul to “at least pretend to be a human being, please, it’s Christmas” has little effect – at first – but over the course of their time together, it’s clear these three lonely people with mountains of baggage will connect on a deeply human level, and find the world a little easier to live in.

That might sound trite and potentially dripping in sentimentality, but director Alexander Payne has balanced The Holdover’s acerbic wit with generosity. So few filmmakers are capable to managing tone the way Payne can.

Paul may be tough and sharp-tongued, but he is decent. He’s not driven by malevolence.

Giamatti, reuniting with Payne after the two made Sideways in 2004, gives a towering but restrained portrayal. There’s nothing mannered or false about Giamatti’s character, you feel the textures of a man burdened with disappointments. He doesn’t bluster or blubber, he just is. It’s a humanist performance and deserving of all the accolades.

Similarly, Sessa (a newcomer Payne discovered in a high school drama program) and Randolph (currently the frontrunner for a best supporting actress Oscar) are pitch perfect, diving into the rich seams of David Hemingson’s screenplay. Their vulnerabilities are there but it’s never maudlin.

Payne is a wonderful world-builder of small communities and the specificities and personalities contained within them. From opening shots of snow-shovelling and choir practice, you know exactly where you are. Plus, there’s the needle drops which include The Allman Brothers, Temptations, Cat Stevens and Chet Baker.

He knows how to tell character-driven emotional stories with humour and heart.

The Holdovers is less astringent than Sideways and About Schmidt and as gentle as The Descendants and, particularly, About Schmidt. It’s also smart, like Payne’s masterful 1999 political satire Election.

It’s been a decade since Payne made an exquisite film (it’s easier to forget the 2017 Matt Damon movie Downsizing exists) and The Holdovers is a confident roaring comeback.

Rating: 5/5

The Holdovers is in cinemas from Thursday, January 11