Film review
The Holdovers 2023
Directed by Alexander Payne133 minDrama · Comedy
A curmudgeonly instructor at a New England prep school is forced to remain on campus during Christmas break to babysit the handful of students with nowhere to go. Eventually, he forms an unlikely bond with one of them — a damaged, brainy troublemaker — and with the school’s head cook, who has just lost a son in Vietnam.
½Watched 6 February 2024
This is definitely the recency bias but that was the best film ever.
Emotional rollercoaster. I was smiling and crying the whole film. I knew nothing about this film but I just had a feeling I would love it and I loved it more than I could have imagined. What an incredible film. The writing was soooo good, it felt a little long but it had some of the most well written characters I’ve seen in a long time so I didn’t really care. Definitely up there with my favourite films of all time.
Why are American bowling balls so small? Is that an America thing? That confused me.
The performances were wow. Paul Giamatti. Wow.
The cinematography was very very cool. I loved the crash zooms were very cool. Stylistically just very nice and wonderful soundtrack.
Overall the characters were incredibly interesting and the film had me on edge the whole time. When something bad or surprising happened I felt it in my chest. This is the kind of film I want to write and I’m gonna use it as a reference for every film I write for the rest of my life. That’s how you write good characters.
9.2/10
