The Importance of Vietnam and the Draft to This Story
"On the surface," I suppose, "The Holdovers" is a human interest story with such familar characters as the cantankerous middle-aged teacher and the problem student with promise, and the wise female servant figure.
But deep within the nostalgic 1970 atmosphere of "The Holdovers" is a deadly serious undertow: the effect of the Vietnam War and the attendant draft on the characters.
We are fifty years gone from when President Nixon(!) ended the draft in 1973, but for those of us who grew up in the era when it was active, that draft was a scary thing that put a lot of pressure not only on young men, but on their mothers and their fathers. (Women were not drafted.)
Consider what the draft meant:
It meant that a mother and father could birth a baby boy, raise him to age 18 -- and have the government take him away and kill him. For draft-age young men, living past 18, 19, or 20 was NOT guranteed in the era of the draft. For parents, their babies could be taken away and killed, just like that.
Now there were possible other outcomes even if one served in Vietnam. Most of the soldiers survived and came back home. Many of the soldiers didn't worry about the draft, they ENLISTED because they wanted a military career and wanted to fight for their country.
But The Holdovers is about something different and more usual: you could escape the draft with a "college deferrment" -- go to college, miss the draft -- and so in the Vietnam years, guys who could go to college stayed OUT of Vietnam and guys who could NOT go to college WENT to Vietnam. (I'm oversimplifying, but those were the basics.)
And The Holdovers confronts this right up front: Angus, the young hero of the story, is deathly afraid of flunking college and being sent to military school, because the combination will leave him open to ...going to Vietnam.
Meanwhile, the son of Mary, the African-American cook, could NOT get into college, elected to go to Vietnam(I think he enlisted, I can't recall) and got killed at 18 or so. His mother plunged into despair.
This is not a "lightweight" story.
And this: for ALL young men in the Vietnam draft years BEFORE one had to confront whether or not college would be an escape..there was a "lottery" (every few months? I can't remember) in which families would gather round the TV to see if the son drew a high number than made him eligible for service, or a low number which did not. TOTALLY arbitraty -- this boy escapes Vietnam, this boy has to go (until the deferrments are sought -- medical included.)
Mary has lost a young son in Vietnam. Angus fears going to Vietnam. As for our third character -- Paul Giamatti's teacher -- he tells Angus that he did HIS duty in WWII (when there was a greater sense of duty to a more justifiable war) but I've already forgotten WHAT Giamatti did -- I don't think it was combat-related.
Which was another element of American military service from WWII on -- not ALL military jobs were combat jobs.
And yes: in WWII , there were all sorts of stories about teenage boys lying about their age to GET INTO the war(this included some movie actors) but...well, sometimes a generation wants to fight, and sometimes not. (Does it depend on the WAR? Or did families just start wanting to hang onto their boys and avoid their deaths?)
The Holdovers is set in 1970 and we see the characters watch "LIttle Big Man" on the big screen. But there was another 1970 movie that was more "on point" to Vietnam: Patton.
And while Patton is famous for George C. Scott's opening speech, the more harrowing scene -- for parents and sons alike -- was the scene where Scott's Patton slaps a young soldier for being in an infirmary tent over a nervous breakdown(he is crying) rather than the limb-removing incuries of the other soldiers in the tent.
It was a very uncomfortable scene(written by Francis Coppola) that crystallized the issue: is it cowardly to want to avoid combat and dying at 18?
The Holdovers touches on all of this directly or indirectly. There are many other great plot points in the story(the lonlieness of the characters, their hopes for love) but the Vietnam Draft element hangs over everything.
And Mary loses out from it. She loses her son. (Draft or not.)