The Holdovers

In 1970 at Barton Academy, a snowy New England boarding school, a strict, sharp-tongued history teacher is stuck supervising a few boys who cannot go home for Christmas. One of them is Angus, a bright but angry troublemaker, joined in the empty campus by Mary, the school cook mourning a son lost in Vietnam. As classes stop and the holiday break stretches on, the three clash, share cramped routines and stolen moments of escape, slowly exposing the hurts and hopes they hide. The film is a warm yet melancholy comedy drama, full of prickly banter, quiet loneliness and small, human gestures that turn a miserable winter into something gently hopeful.