The Holdovers Explained: Escaping Your Past, Found Family... & That Plagiarism Scandal 

I was just going to add this. I was worried about that happening to her character ,and decided to check this movie out after she won a Golden Globe for her role. The writers missed making her a stock magical negro type of character by giving her, first a backstory not too different from the others, then a family that openly loves her, and a possible love interest, and those things I really appreciated. She is her own character. She serves the plot and helps make the point of the plot without sacrificing herself, or being in service to the other characters, who go through their own thing. She's not there to save them but support them, and I appreciate that the other two characters support her and don't ignore or neglect her pain. I wish I could give you extra thumbs up!!!

Agreed. When I saw the trailer I was concerned. I’m a fan of Alexander Payne and I was uncertain about her when I saw the trailer but she was a well written character with her own journey.

Yes, she's a fully realized character.

It took me a while to realize that she's literally named Mary when she's the mother figure in this found family as well as previously a mother to her boy who died in Vietnam 😅 I love that she's given all these nuances which make her more than just the momTM. She doesn't just help and care for Angus and Paul, they look out for her needs and help her deal too! And she gets to have her own angry breakdown at the Christmas party and her path to handling her grief with her sister in the end.

@@timy9197 I love the guy's work but he's not exactly known for diverse casts. Was very relieved.

Did you even watch this movie? There was no hint at this being a plot point…so friendship in movies between a man and woman is mature now? This is not a romantic movie.

@@melissagerson21 I did and enjoyed it very much, thank you for asking. Also to answer your question, he did briefly put his hand on hers during the car ride the day after learning Lydia Crane was married. Mary didn't reciprocate those feelings so he let it go and the storyline continued. I brought it up due to his change in behavior toward Angus before and after leaving the party.

Me too, you might expect that this is the route it will take, but thankfully, Paul and Mary stay platonic at the end. Plus, Mary is still grieving for her son, so romance is likely off the cards for her, at least for now.

@@trinaq Definitely. Plus, Paul didn't fall in love with her because they have a lot in common but because he can't tell the difference between genuine kindness from a woman and romantic interest.

@@BatAmerica True, he's been isolated at Barton for most of his life, that he genuinely doesn't know how to form authentic human connections. He made the same mistake with Lydia, when he mistook her kindness for something more, and then was surprised to see her kissing her boyfriend. Hopefully, he will be able to experience more of the world outside of Barton for the first time.

Giamatti should have won this time.

I keep seeing your comments on a lot of the same channels, and I've always liked what you say, do you have a Letterboxd or social media anywhere? (I don't do TikTok)

Da’Vine’s speech was truly sweet & I’m glad she won. Giamatti is terrific as the grump with a heart of gold, but he stood little chance of beating Cillian Murphy for “Oppenheimer”. However it’s truly one of Paul Giamatti’s best performances in the last decade

It truly is one of last year’s best. I enjoyed the dynamics between the three main characters & you see them become their own strange little family. And man the ending is so good & a great change in Giamatti’s character where he sacrifices his livelihood to make Angus’s life better and give him that second chance the boy desperately needs

Oh don't tease me with such ideas. I imagine a beautiful sequel where these three characters inadvertently meet again after several (like ten or twenty) years, and get into some more shenanigans, while fighting their regrets and personal demons again!

You’ve got the Breakfast Club setup here with the three leads & yeah Paul Giamatti’s professor is the grouch version of Robin Williams 😆

She really is the heart of the group & she’s the one who calls everyone out on their idiotic behavior. Da’Vine gave such a beautiful performance and her speech was heartwarming

She’s got her share of cutting hilarious lines, but it’s really her heartfelt moments that ground that beautiful performance

I hope Dominic gets some more roles. I enjoyed his performance here

I love how the ending resolves a lot of things, but at the same time it doesn't provide a clear resolution on what happened to the relationship. It is very typical of Alexander Payne's movies and you can see it repeated in the Holdovers.

@@augustosolari7721 I felt so much for them, that I wanted to know more about their lives after they split up, and I don't want to curse anything, but I would be willing to watch a sequel about their lives and what they went through over ten or twenty years later, (even if its sad). (I don't think there should be a sequel but I like imagining one.)

@@lkeke35 There was a sequel in the works at some time...

The similarities are really not too close to comfort. The similarities are literally just common plot beats often found in these types of stories. The stories remain quite different

I think it was for most of the audiences who saw it. I work at a theatre and we had a lot of older audiences seeing the film, but we had a fair share of younger (18+) who did go watch it too

The Variety article that broke the story includes pages from the doccument shared with the WGA and others that includes exerpts from both the Frisco and Holdovers scripts and there really are a LOT of similarities

Friscoe is avail in its entirity on the black list. Im a hobbyist screenwriter and I know many screenwriters (some professional) who have read it as well, and seem to conclude it's not really plagarized. There are similarities but they're very common emotional beats in these angry mentor/mentee stories and aren't exclusive to The Holdovers or Friscoe (as even this video points out). It was also a big claim from the screenwriter to say they're line to line transcriptions when they really werent. He also used examples and compared stuff like establishing shots the same which is pretty insane to me. One script starting off by describing the setting and another doing the same is part of screenwriting. You have to establish where you are. The writer also claimed that there were differences, but they were shallow like Holdovers being set in a school vs his being in a hospital, the protagonist in Holdovers being an angry male student vs his being a female patient, and other details. He discounted details that actually made up key differences that explained character motivation.

They did quite a few of them when they came out like Barbie and Oppenheimer

It wasn’t till I looked on IMDB that I saw it was shot on digital. They fooled me good and I loved its aesthetic

They’ve been doing that for decades. Go look at Grease for example 😅

Not at all.

Shut up.

So, A) black people didn't exist in the 70s apparently, and B) the inclusion of one alone trumps the incredible writing, directing, and performances in this movie. I'm sorry, but merely including minorities in a movie does not ruin a movie.

@@robynmateo A) They existed, but were usually not included in the story, except maybe in minor roles. Even as late as the 90's, you had classics like Home Alone or Groundhog Day that had no minorities at all. B) Yes, at this point adding just one ruins the movie. Why? Because of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion. Because it's now forced. Which means that whenever you see even one on screen, you can never know if they are there because they are the best person for the role or because they are there to check a box.

@@Inquiringmind0 A) This film is a period piece. Black people existed in the 70s. Just because movies tended not to include them back then is no excuse to exclude them now. B) Diversity is only forced if you view it as forced. I personally think DaVine Joy Randolph was picked because she was the best person for the role. How do I know that? Because she was AMAZING in it. I think it's somewhat racist to always question the legitimacy of black roles, but never the legitimacy of white roles. If it ruins the movie, answer this: if Mary Lamb were white, but virtually nothing else in the movie changed, would that actually have made the movie better?

The Holdovers wasn't trying to recreate the cinema of the 70's. Neither was it presenting the 70's in an unrealistic way. It was depicting the common lives of ordinary people during the actual real-life 70's, which involved both majority people and minority people. As you say, there were definitely minorities in America during the 70's and it is not a stretch to assume that a minority person would work in the cafeteria of a private school, as depicted in the film. In fact, it makes complete sense, due to the career limitations minorities faced at the time. And it makes sense that she would be present in the story, since the holdover students would need someone to run the cafeteria over winter break. She would naturally be one of the few remaining adults on campus. I agree that Hollywood gets too caught up in appealing to twitter politics (just look at Disney), but I don't think the Holdovers movie is an example of that. I think it's a movie that just happens to have a black character because it logically fits the story, not because it makes the moviemakers look politically correct. I sincerely believe that, because the other characters don't make a big deal about her being black or act like they're morally better by association with her and she doesn't act like she's morally better than other people just because she's black. Instead, she acts with care and concern for others. You may have a different view, but that doesn't look like checking a box to me. ... And if you don't mind me asking, what bothers you about seeing minority people in cinema? I'd like to know more about your opinion.

Known rapist???