Inhospitable Escalations
Reviews and Comments by Ken Burke
I invite you to join me on a regular basis to see how my responses to current cinematic offerings compare to the critical establishment, which I’ll refer to as either the CCAL (Collective Critics at Large) if they’re supportive or the OCCU (Often Cranky Critics Universe) when they go negative. However, due to COVID concerns I’m mostly addressing streaming options with limited visits to theaters, where I don’t think I’ve missed much anyway, but better options are on the horizon. (Note: Anything in bold blue below [some may look near purple] is a link to something more in the review.)
My reviews’ premise: “You can’t please everyone, so you got to please yourself.”
(from "Garden Party" by Rick Nelson and the Stone Canyon Band, 1972 album of the same name)
12/13/2023—As of December 12, 2023 Film Reviews from Two Guys in the Dark's been posting for 12 years without Pat Craig (on the left in the above photo, taken 12 yrs. ago in the summer) doing even 1 review, which was not his original intention although, as Scottish poet Robert Burns noted in 1786 in his To a Mouse poem (with some language adjustment) “The best-laid plans of mice and men often go awry.” However, I have no regrets about that due to my dear friend Pat passing away this year, even as I’ve kept the name of the blog as Two Guys because “One Guy in the Dark” just sounds too forlorn. During that time we’ve (well, I’ve) reviewed a total of 1,147 cinematic offerings to the world in a total of 600 posts with total unique hits of 2,200,597 (not counting whatever happens with this one) from all over the globe. Thanks to everyone who’s ever even glanced at our existence.
It’s been a great pleasure sharing my commentary on contemporary releases with you, but Film Reviews from Two Guys in the Dark takes a holiday vacation for the next 2 weeks, reconnecting in early January 2024. But I’ve still got some material to offer as 2023 makes its way to the end, probably more verbose than needed, but I wanted to provide you plenty to plow through until I return.
The Holdovers (Alexander Payne) rated R 133 min.
Here’s the trailer:
(Use the full screen button in the image’s lower right to enlarge its size;
activate the same button or use “esc” keyboard key to return to normal.)
If you can abide plot spoilers read on, but this blog’s intended for those who’ve seen the film or want to save some $ (as well as recognizing those readers like me who just aren’t that tech-savvy). To help any of you who want to learn more details yet avoid these all-important plot-reveals I’ll identify any give-away sentences/sentence-clusters with colors plus arrows:
⇒The first and last words will be noted with arrows and red.⇐ OK, now continue on if you prefer.
What Happens: We’re in December 1970, just before Christmas break, at upscale Barton Academy prep school (fictional, somewhere in the Northeast) where demanding, sarcastic Paul Hunham (Paul Giamatti)—poor-smelling due to a medical condition—teaches Ancient History to a class of senior boys, with a wealth of D and F grades on their final exams, except for Angus Tully’s (Dominic Sessa) B+, but he further distances himself from his classmates when Hunham offers another exam after the holidays but with inclusion of additional material to which Tully objects (doesn’t want to waste vacation time studying) with the result of no make-overs, existing grades stand (so his classmates are steamed at him, but he obviously has problems with schools as he’s already been kicked out of 3 of them). Hunham’s not liked by his Headmaster, Dr. Hardy Woodrip (Andrew Garman), either due to previously failing the son of a major donor, resulting in the boy not attending Dad’s chosen location of Princeton so Hunham’s an outcast among the faculty, no friends or family, yet in his grumpy, uncompromising attitude such isolation seems to be no problem for him.
His true problem, though, is that 4 of the students have no place to go during the holidays (younger Ye-Joon Park’s [Jim Kaplan] from Korea, too far to travel home for just 2 weeks, and Alex Ollerman’s [Ian Dolley] the child of Mormon missionaries, currently out of the country; seniors Jason Smith [Michael Provost], the school’s quarterback, and Teddy Kountze [Brady Harper], an obnoxious non-friend of Tully’s, both seem to have some parental issues), so Hunham’s been chosen (maybe in retribution) to supervise them while they stay at the school; then Tully’s added to the mix because his mother, Judy Clotfelter (Gillian Vigman), decides to go on a honeymoon with Tully’s new stepdad, Stanley Clotfelter (Tate Donovan), so it’s clear neither Hunham nor Tully care for this assignment, although they have no choice. The other holdover is kitchen manager Mary Lamb (Da’Vine Joy Randolph), responsible for feeding the other “inmates,” although she’s grieving over the loss of her son, Curtis, in Vietnam, an outstanding Barton student (graduated 1969) but couldn’t afford college so was drafted (further, her husband died some time ago in a shipyard accident). After some initial bickering among the 5 students—and disgust from the seniors Hunham’s continuing their academics during the exile—something changes with Jason’s father who agrees to send a helicopter to the campus to take all the boys on a ski trip for the duration of the break, yet Angus can’t join them because he can’t make contact with his parents for permission to leave, so animosity between him and Hunham continues, although this misanthrope teacher does display true sympathy toward Mary.
During one verbal confrontation between teacher and student, leading to a chase through the building, Angus falls, dislocates his shoulder (that happened to me years ago [just the shoulder, no chase], hurts like hell until it’s popped back into place), yet at the hospital the kid takes all the blame to protect Hunham, a favor reciprocated at a restaurant when Hunham diffuses a growing-altercation between Angus and a disabled war vet. As Christmas Eve arrives, the 3 holdovers, along with janitor Danny (Naheem Garcia), attend a party given by school administrator Lydia Crane (Carrie Preston), with Angus getting very attracted to Crane’s niece Elise (Darby Lily Lee-Stack) even as Hunham seems to be flirting with Lydia, stopped short when her significant other arrives. Mary gets drunk, cries about Curtis, so Paul insists they leave which angers Angus, blurting out that his father is dead. In an attempt to change the temper of their situation, Hunham suggests a “field trip” to Boston, dropping Mary off in nearby-Roxbury to visit her pregnant younger sister. In the city, Paul and Angus seem to get closer as they ice skate, visit museums until they run into an old Harvard classmate of Hunham’s, as Paul lies about his current career with Angus supporting the fabrications.
Teacher and student then enter a liquor store where the kid challenges his elder about breaking the school’s code of total honesty, so Hunham reveals he was dismissed from Harvard because his roommate plagiarized Paul’s senior thesis, then claimed he was the victim so Hunham hit him, resulting in being expelled (Hunham never finished college, was hired to teach at Barton by Woodrip, as they’d been classmates at the school years ago). Then the 2 tourists go to a screening of Little Big Man (Arthur Penn, 1970), with Angus attempting to slip away until Paul catches him, learns the kid just wants to visit his Dad, who’s actually alive but a patient in a local mental hospital. ⇒Hunham agrees, so Angus meets with Thomas Tully (Stephen Thorne), clearly lost in a mental fog, so Paul assures the kid neither of them needs to repeat the fates of their fathers, that a better life can be open to them. Back at Barton, Paul, Angus, Mary, and Danny watch the NY New Year’s Eve ball-drop on TV, but when classes resume Hunham is called into Woodrip’s office where Tully’s Mom and Stepdad are angry about the unauthorized visit to see Thomas (he became violent afterward), with Hunham lying, saying he encouraged the idea; this prevents Angus from being sent off to military school, but it also results in Hunham being fired. As he prepares to drive away, Mary gives him a notebook into which he can finally write the monograph that he’s long contemplated.⇐
So What? For those viewers (such as my wife, Nina) who prefer humanistic portrayals of character-development to slam-bang-action-movies, The Holdovers is a perfect choice as all 3 primary players here inhabit roles considerably more complex than their surface attributes imply. A good number of awards followed its notable presence in the cinematic-marketplace with Randolph—a small role as Mahalia Jackson in Rustin (George C. Wolfe; review in our November 23, 2023 posting), also would be remembered as police detective Donna Williams in Hulu’s streaming-series-success, Only Murders in the Building—winning Best Supporting Actress honors for The Holdovers from, among others, the Boston Society of Film Critics, the Chicago Film Critics Association, the Los Angeles Film Critics Association, New York Film Critics Circle, and the National Board of Review, while Giamatti’s won as Best Actor from the Chicago critics and the National Board of Review whose members also listed the film among their Top Ten of the year (plus Best Original Screenplay for David Hemingson) just as did the American Film Institute and the Boston critics. Come January 7, 2024 we’ll see if the Golden Globe noms for Best Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy, Actor – Motion Picture Musical or Comedy (Giamatti), and Supporting Actress (Randolph) pay off as well. So far, though, Payne’s gotten little support as Best Director. (But, he’s competing with Martin Scorsese [Killers of the Flower Moon; review in our November 9, 2023 posting], yet I think this is his best since Sideways [2004, won Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay, Payne and Jim Taylor], another great collaboration with Giamatti. After watching his character’s adulation of pinot noir wine Nina and I went to the Santa Ynez Valley in Santa Barbara county, CA—where that film is set—to taste that good stuff, found it to be sold out everywhere as many others also encouraged by this film got there before we did. [I still enjoy the occasional merlot as well as the pinot, though.]).
Relative to the academic environment of The Holdovers, I might have had an opportunity to meet Payne at some point because he had been a student of my Mills College (now Mills College at Northeastern University, Oakland, CA) colleague, Dr. Mario Cavallari, when Mario taught at Stanford U.; unfortunately, no connections of that sort ever happened (nor will they, as Mario died in 2016; it may be dangerous to have me as a close friend). You can hear directly from Payne, however, in this short (1:33) anatomy of a scene, the revelatory-conversation between Paul and Angus in the Boston liquor store. Although there are still many of the 2023 likely Best Film contenders that I haven’t seen yet, I’m sure The Holdovers has a solid shot at being among my tops of the year (nothing beats Killer of the Flower Moon so far, though; I doubt anything will*). The acting (as noted above) is marvelously-well-presented, the snowy setting fits well with the coldness each of the 3 main characters hold in their hearts regarding past grievances (although each of them are able to conjure up some warmth as the occasion demands), no easily final victories come for any of them yet they end up better than when we first met them with further healing hopefully to come. I highly recommend The Holdovers, a film you can still find in theaters or through various streaming options.
*Killers ... is also winning awards, among many others as Best Picture by the Chicago (plus Best Adapted Screenplay for Eric Roth and Scorsese, Best Original Score for now-departed Robbie Robertson) and New York critics' associations, the National Board of Review (also Best Director for Scorsese, Best Actress for Lily Gladstone, Best Cinematography for Rodrigo Prieto). Gladstone is Best Actress for the Boston and New York critics, the National Board of Review; the Golden Globes gave this film 7 nominations all in major categories, so tune in come early January to see the results.
Bottom Line Final Comments: This film went into limited domestic (U.S.-Canada) release on October 27, 2023, then went wider on November 10, is still holding on after 7 weeks but now down to 923 theaters from its high of 1,601, having made so far a relatively-minor-sum of $16.5 million (no international details at this time, but that seems to be the result of no screenings yet, though it’s set to debut in the U.K. on January 19, 2024). If you can’t find it playing near you, please look into streaming where you can rent it for 48 hrs. from Amazon Prime Video, Apple TV+, Vudu, etc., but be prepared for a steeper price than normal, $19.99. The CCAL joins me in encouraging you to give yourself a holiday present via watching this ultimately-satisfying-film (despite the many encountered tribulations therein), as Rotten Tomatoes positive reviews are 96% (accurate, based on 249 of them last time I checked), while the Metacritic average score is 82% (quite high for their usual results), so while this film is often called a comedy (there are a good number of laughs, none cheaply set up) it’s quite a serious look at how past events (distant or more immediate) influence our entire perception of life, even when we assume we have these demons under control, never warning us beforehand when they going to muck up our present in various small or considerably larger ways.
So, I’ll bring this to a close with my usual tactic of a Musical Metaphor, Pink Floyd’s “Another Brick in the Wall (Part 2)” (on their 1979 album The Wall) at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K6PwUG 283DU, which might be too obvious a choice where The Holdovers is concerned, but, as I note at the end of my comments on Leave the World Behind about how ease led me to easy picks for the music, it’s been a very busy week, including getting my misplaced cell-phone replaced because I’m on the AT&T account as “Ken Burke” but my driver’s license (required for verification to be able to attach the old phone number to the new device) shows “Larry Kenneth Burke” even though my parents always called me “Kenny” (a Southern tendency to use the middle name, I guess, as my Texas Dad, his sister, and my Georgia mother-in-law all did the same thing with their middles), so suddenly, after doing business with this company for years, I couldn’t proceed much past “Hello” until I had to drive back home, get Nina, bring her to the AT&T store (her I.D. matches her account name) to verify changing me to “Larry” before I could go on with the phone replacement. (At least it wasn’t a costly situation as a new flip phone [don’t need anything better; Nina helps keep Apple in business] only cost $30 at Target; however, that savings will soon be offset by Nina getting attracted to the more-current-models of iPhones so she’s going back on Friday to upgrade … oh well, Merry Christmas!)
OK, where were we? Oh, yeah, with me championing “Another Brick …,” which certainly fits the mood of the Barton students about “No dark sarcasm in the classroom” regarding Hunham’s caustic-mood toward them (he has an ongoing distaste for the social privilege most of his students enjoy), although as shown by their efforts on those final exams most of them may be just as bad at building “don’t bother me” walls as is Hunham, so we have a situation through most of the film that amounts to “All in all, you’re just another brick in the wall” for all of them. As time goes on, though, at least Paul, Angus, and Mary begin to find ways of breaking down their walls without having to go to the violent extremes we see in my chosen video, which is not the case in the next review on our agenda.
(an attempt at) SHORT TAKES (spoilers also appear here)
Here’s the trailer:
Before reading further, please refer to the plot spoilers warning detailed far above.
Given that this film’s based on a novel by Rumaan Alam (2020 [plot’s generally similar except at the end, according to a summary I read]) you may already be aware of its contents but I was not, so I found it fascinating that so much chaos is happening with little clear explanation is to what’s truly going on as our isolated main characters find themselves in increasingly-hostile-situations. It all begins calmly enough with satellite shots of Earth, then a woman, Amanda Sanford (Julia Roberts), who works in advertising (says she hates people, due to her job) seems to be the demanding-decision-maker in her marriage compared to her easy-going-husband, Clay (Ethan Hawke), an English professor in NYC’s City College (founding institution of the City University of New York; I once worked for a couple of years in the early 1970s at the Queens College branch of the sprawling structure). As he wakes up one day he finds Amanda’s rented a getaway-house on Long Island (but not that far from the city) for the weekend, already packed their bags so there’s no discussion to be had, leading to the parents and their 2 teens—older Archie (Charlie Evans), younger Rose (Farrah Mackenzie)—soon arriving at their luxurious destination where the kids quickly find enjoyment in the pool, but then problems arise as the phones and TV don’t work, neither does the Wi-Fi so Rose is despondent she can’t get access to streaming of the final episode of NBC TV’s Friends (1994-2004), as she’s become connected to the characters, wants to see how what she’s been binging works out.
Things then become more complicated when a knock comes on the door late at night with George (G.H.) Scott (Mahershala Ali) and his daughter Ruth (Maha’la) showing up, saying they own the house, have left an event in the Bronx to come out here because there’s a blackout in the city (he can’t show any I.D. because he left his wallet in his overcoat as they hurriedly left the event). Clay’s OK with it, but Amanda’s resistant, not convinced these 2 are who they say they are, but after an offer to refund half of their rental payment she accepts (money’s in a cabinet nearby), as long as they sleep in the basement (never made explicit White Amanda distrusts the sudden-arrivals because they’re Black, yet this dubious-implication’s clear to us, felt by Scott and his teenage-daughter too).
As the next couple of days go on, increasingly-disturbing events occur: Rose sees a herd of deer in the back yard; a flock of flamingos land in the pool (huh?); brief alerts break through the silence saying there’s been a massive cyberattack throughout the country; navigation abnormalities cause an oil tanker to crash on the beach causing the Sanfords to flee; G.H. goes to get info from neighbors, the Scotts, but finds their home empty and trashed, then sees 2 jetliners crash into the beach; Clay tries to drive to the nearby-town to get info but no GPS help, instead sees a drone dropping leaflets in Arabic that basically say “Death to America” (later learns leaflets have been dropped in San Francisco but in Korean or Mandarin); the Sanfords try to escape, find the highway blocked by numerous-driverless-Tesla cars slamming into each other; a painfully-loud-sound quickly comes/goes; Amanda and Ruth go to a shed near the property, find themselves surrounded by deer they will chase away by yelling, then they can distantly see NYC being utterly destroyed by bombs.
Situations on a more interpersonal level raise the intensity also as Archie’s lusting after Ruth, Ruth’s convinced Clay’s coming on to her; after some whiskey, music, and close dancing Amanda and G.H. seem ready to connect but respect their marriages (G.H’s wife’s an art dealer on her way home from Morocco, may have died in one of those plane crashes); ⇒local survivalist Danny (Kevin Bacon) finally agrees to trade some medicine Archie needs for cash. After all this tension’s built up, the story ends with Rose wandering to the abandoned home of the Thorns, finding a well-stocked bomb shelter which has an info-screen with news of attacks on the White House and East Coast cities plus a wall of DVDs allowing her to finally access that long-desired last “Friends” episode.⇐ (You can get more plot details here.) Until I recently stumbled onto a couple of reviews of Leave the World Behind I hadn’t even heard of it so I’m glad I got a chance to watch, even though there’s a lot of weird stuff going on here that doesn’t fully get explained—if you choose to see it, which the CCAL somewhat encourages with RT positives at 75%, MC average score at 67%—this after-the-fact-aid (12:16, contains Spoilers of course [ad interrupts at 8:12]) may offer an opportunity for some dialogue/interpretations/arguments over what’s occurring here. Certainly the sense of increasing doom’s presented well, with the acting quite effective (especially by the old pros, but the young females genuinely contribute too [we don’t really get much from Archie, though; I guess there was only so much screen space to go around, even within this slightly-longer-than-normal-running-time]).
Overall, I’d say—unless the current unstable state of the world gives you enough to worry about so you don’t need to see a version of what the next level might be—this is an intriguing-enough-experience, although you’ll have to be a Netflix subscriber to get it (as noted in our recent postings, you can sign up for just a month for $6.99 with ads or $15.49 no ads, then after Leave … if you binge for a bit you can also see other Netflix offerings, including ones I’ve reviewed in our most recent Two Guys postings. Netflix did release it in limited domestic [U.S.-Canada] theaters on November 22, 2023 prior to the December 8, 2023 streaming debut; as usual, no box-office grosses reported). To wrap up, as a combination of me being a bit weary to think of something more impactful for a Musical Metaphor (due to much time consumed this week going to a Berkeley Rep play—a fabulous 1-man-show, Harry Clarke, starring Billy Crudup—looking frantically for my lost cell-phone, going through the process of buying and setting up a replacement, along with having a great dinner with some old friends Nina and I haven’t seen in months) and believing my actual choice does have some relevance with this film, I’ve gone along with Rose’s obsession and chosen the Friends theme song at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s2TyVQGoCYo because by the end of what we see of this evolving story all of the characters are probably desperately feeling “So no one told you life was gonna be this way […] I’ll be there for you / When the rain starts to pour / I’ll be there for you […] ‘Cause you’re there for me too” (if you want more than 54 seconds from a Metaphor, though, here’s an extended video [3:13, with the principal 6 actors from the show interacting with the band, The Rembrandts, although for me this one gets as tedious as I felt the few times I tried watching the show as I much preferred the humor of Seinfeld {NBC 1989-1998}, but I still give all of this to you in respect for recently-departed cast member Matthew Perry, as I know he was beloved by so many]).
To at least bring some sense of closure to what we see in Leave the World Behind, here’s what Rose was looking for: the last scene from the final Friends episode (4:35), which definitely gave closure to that well-loved, well-acknowledged sitcom. (A final note is Barack and Michelle Obama are executive producers of this film, if that has any influence on whether you watch it or not.) You might also be interested in this interview with Rumaan Alam, author of the foundational novel.
Related Links Which You Might Find Interesting:
Some options: (1) IMDb's recommendations for the best in theaters and streaming in December 2023; (2) Killers of the Flower Moon now available for streaming rental; (3) Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour now available for streaming rental; (4) 25 new titles added to the National Film Registry; (5) Complete list of the Golden Globe Awards nominees (Barbie leads with 10; ceremony on CBS TV on January 7, 2024); (6) Variety's opinion of 10 movies Oscar voters should see (It's a good thing I’m not a member of the Academy, as I’ve seen only 1 of them [so far]).
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