The Holdovers’ stroke of genius was making its main character stink of fish

The history of cinema is littered with flawed protagonists. Imperfections are, after all, what make characters relatable – from Bruce Wayne to Frances Ha. But amid the sea of rogues and misfits, there have been few that are flawed in quite the same off-putting way as Paul Hunham, the lead character of Alexander Payne’s effusively received 1970-set drama The Holdovers. Released last week, the Golden Globe-winning film is set at a mostly empty boarding school over the Christmas holidays, with classics professor Hunham (played by Paul Giamatti) serving as childminder.

Giamatti’s character is a human smorgasbord of physical abnormalities: he has a lazy eye (the prosthetic for which switches socket impishly throughout the film) and trimethylaminuria, a condition in which the body is unable to metabolise trimethylamine. Throughout the film, this latter dysfunction causes other characters to complain that he stinks of fish. The indignities don’t end there, either: The Holdovers sees Hunham weather all manner of social slings and arrows. In one particularly brutal sequence, he allows himself a glimmer of romantic optimism, attending the party of friendly fellow staff member Lydia Crane. Sitting alone at the soiree, Human is framed in a close-up, when he sees Lydia locking lips with another man. It’s a scene of biting disappointment, scratched wonderfully across Giamatti’s face. It’s a humiliation to which only we, the viewers, are privy – one more embarrassment to throw on the pile. On the surface, it’s a risky gambit making Hunham so woefully put upon. He’s repellent, both olfactorily (by chance) and interpersonally (by choice). Why, then, aren’t we repelled too?

Therein lies the greatness of The Holdovers, a film best characterised as “the kind of affable middlebrow comedy-drama they don’t seem to make anymore”. The arc of Giamatti’s character is spelt out from the film’s very early scenes: forced to take care of the young “heldover” students over Christmas – including, most significantly, a rebellious senior played by newcomer Dominic Sessa – Hunham slowly breaks out of his embittered rut, and opens himself up, however cautiously, to the possibilities of the world. It’s solid if far-from-groundbreaking material: sentimental but never quite mawkish. What tips it from being just a well-oiled Oscar-bait drama into a truly exceptional character study is just how cruel it’s prepared to get with its characters. It’s in this cruelty that the film finds its emotional core; sharp edges cut all the deeper.

The Holdovers is a meditation in dignity – what it means to have it, and how people cope when it’s threatened. Giamatti’s character throughout is a curious mix of high and low status. As a tenured professor, he holds a certain degree of power over the various students (whom he bitterly condescends) and custodial staff, including cafeteria worker Mary Lamb (Da’Vine Joy Randolph). But this power never translates to respect: he is mocked behind his back and sneered at to his face. At one point, he leans in for a hug with Mary, and she recoils – we are left to infer that it’s because of his odour. There’s an abject lack of vanity to the character, and to Giamatti, whose emergence as a frontrunner this awards season has been hard to quarrel with.

It’s rare to see a film willing to make its central character this unappealing – not merely this, but unappealing in a deeply unglamorous fashion. For some strange reason, it can be harder to sympathise with someone like Hunham than it is with a cold-blooded but charismatic villain like Tony Soprano. Giamatti’s lonely, foul-smelling academic seems crafted to evoke pure pity. And yet the magic of The Holdovers is that pity eventually blossoms into something more. We learn to appreciate the small ways Hunham recovers his dignity, in spite of a life and a body that betray him. From bitter cruelty comes deep compassion. By the end of the film, you’ll be rooting for him – even if it means holding your nose.

‘The Holdovers’ is in cinemas now