THE HOLDOVERS***** - BFI London Film Festival 2023 - Day 9

Alexander Payne returns to form with a film that is funny, affecting and just plain human.  It is a film that earns every emotional payoff over a steady, even lugubriously paced two hour plus running time.  By the end of it, one feels that one has come to know and care for these characters. I wasn’t ready to leave them.

The story takes place in an elite boarding school in 1970. It is an environment of extreme privilege, rubbing up against a world of extreme social inequality.  We are painfully aware that the rich kids go to College where the poor kids get drafted and die in Vietnam. The centre of the story is Paul Giamatti’s disliked, strict, but scabrously funny Ancient Civilisations teacher Mr Hunham.  Having failed a rich kid, Mr Hunham is punished by his headmaster by being left to steward the kids who can’t go home for Christmas.  Events, dear boy, events, soon shrink the “holdovers” down to three people: Mr Hunham; the school cook Mary (Da’vine Joy Randolph); and troubled but smart student Angus (newcomer Dominic Sessa).  As the film unfolds, we realise that these three unlikely bedfellows have more in common that might first appear to be the case. But this isn’t a forced revelation.  Each is grieving or thwarted by the vicissitudes of life.  We learn that no-one is a bad as we might think, nor as straightforward.

There is so much to love about this film - the way the 1970s style is recreated in its opening credits, the costumes and production design - the lightness of touch with which profound material is written and directed - and the uniformly superb performances. It would be justice for Paul Giamatti to be nominated for an Oscar, but my word, do not overlook stunning supporting performances from Da’Vine Joy Randolph and Dominic Sessa. I am sure I am not the only person excited to see what he does next.  It’s crazy to think that this is his first film - or indeed that this is the first feature script written by David Hemingson. Which just goes to show the consistent genius of Alexander Payne in talent spotting such a beautiful script and casting it so well.  Kudos to all involved.

THE HOLDOVERS played Toronto and London 2023 and goes on release in the USA on November 3rd and in the UK on January 19th 2024. 

NEBRASKA - LFF 2013 - Day Three

I am so in love with NEBRASKA it may well be my favourite film of the festival to date, even above the stunningly beautiful GRAVITY.  It's the kind of movie that makes you laugh, reminds you of your real life, gives you beautiful visuals, and when you leave you just want to call your dad and tell him you love him.  

So the story is one of an old man and his son reconnecting on a road trip.  The old man is Woody Grant (Bruce Dern), an alcoholic with Alzheimer's who gets one of those publisher's scam letters and thinks he needs to go to Lincoln, Nebraska, to claim his million dollars. In act of frustration and desperation, his lovely son David (Will Forte) decides to take him and pander to his happy wishes.  But en route, Woody has an accident and they end up detouring to his old home town of Hawthorne, where they catch up with his family and old friends - all of whom have stories about his past and apparently, claims on his newfound wealth.

The movie is consistently laugh-out-loud funny - whether due to the blunt chastisements of Woody and his wife Kate (Jane Squibb) or the menacing idiocy of David's cousins, or the deadpan banter between the ageing brothers.  There's even a brilliant moment of Coen Brothers-style goofball comedy when David and his brother Ross (Bob Odenkirk) decide to "liberate" a compressor that Ed Pegram (the deliciously menacing Stacy Keach) supposedly stole years ago. But what really elevates this film is the wonderful relationship between Woody and David, the evident care that even his badgering wife feels for him, and the touching portrait of a real family complete with inane conversations, petty grievances, and weary old stories. 

There were many moments in this film where I was close to tears and many more where I laughed out loud. Kudos to directer Alexander Payne (THE DESCENDENTS) and writer Bob Nelson for creating a dramedy so consistently engaging and funny and wise and to cinematographer Phedon Papamichael for his stunning widescreen black and white landscapes and family tableaux. 

You can listen to a podcast review of this film below, or subscribe to Bina007 Movie Reviews in iTunes.

NEBRASKA is rated R in the USA and has a running time of 110 minutes.  It played Cannes and London 2013. It opens in the USA on November 22nd; in the UK and Ireland on December 6th; in the Netherlands on December 19th; on February 6th in Argentina; on February 7th in Sweden; in Belgium on February 19th; and in Italy on February 20th.