Watch: 60 Sec Film School with Alexander Payne of ‘The Holdovers’

“I hope audiences feel it’s a successful and unforced, lived in sense of period and time.” Focus Features has revealed a brief behind-the-scenes featurette for The Holdovers, the latest film by filmmaker Alexander Payne (Election, Sideways, The Descendants, Nebraska). It already started playing in limited theaters this past weekend, expanding in wide release throughout November. This featurette focuses on making the film feel like it was made in and takes place in the 1970s, which is not as easy anymore in the 2020s. With no family and nowhere to go over the Christmas holiday in 1970, Paul remains at school to supervise students unable to journey home. After a few days, only one student holdover remains — a trouble-making 15-year-old named Angus. Joining Paul & Angus is head cook Mary, an African American woman whose own son was recently lost in Vietnam. These very different people form an unlikely Christmas family sharing comic misadventures during two snowy weeks. With Paul Giamatti, Dominic Sessa, Da’Vine Joy Randolph, and Carrie Preston. The video also features Payne’s DP Eigil Bryld working with him next to the camera. // Continue Reading ›