I love this topic!
I just watched the Holiday on Netflix. It’s from 2006, so I’m not sure if it really counts for this challenge but here’s my recap (with spoilers hidden in the summary). I enjoyed this fun romp, although I’m not sure it passes the Bechdel test.
Two women get their hearts broken right before Christmas and via the internet, arrange to swap houses for two weeks. Iris (played by Kate WInslet) heads to L.A. where she luxuriates in an enormous house with many rooms and a swimming pool. Meanwhile, Amanda (played by Cameron Diaz) ends up in a cute but cold English cottage just outside London where she was promised there are zero men. The movie goes back and forth between England and L.A., but I’m separating them out here.
Summary
The Story in a Small Town Outside London:
- Almost immediately, Iris’ brother Graham (Jude Law) drunkenly shows up at the door expecting to find Iris and hoping to sleep off his buzz. Amanda lets him spend the night.
- [I was very confused for a bit because I’m terrible at recognizing actors and I thought the man who arrived was actually Jasper, Iris’ ex pretending to be Iris’ brother. Good thing I was wrong about that! Near the end of the movie, I finally recognized Jasper from *the Man in the High Castle,* in which the actor Rufus Sewell plays one of the Nazis. Why do I assume all handsome dark haired men are the same character?]
- No surprise, they have sex but only after Amanda surprises him by saying that foreplay is over-rated and she hasn’t cried since she was 14 years old. They assure each other it’s just a one-time thing and Amanda will certainly not fall in love with Graham.
- Graham and Amanda continue hanging out. He gets phone calls from “Sophie” and “Olivia” and Amanda realizes he’s quite the womanizer.
- Amanda decides the cottage is just too, too cold, and it’s too lonely there so she’ll go to Amsterdam instead. But I’m worried because who will take care of Iris’ dog? This is not addressed.
- Fortunately, Amanda doesn’t get on the plane because she realizes it was fun to hang out with Graham. So I don’t need to worry about the cute puppy anymore.
- She decides to surprise Graham with a visit. He answers the door quite disheveled and you hear glass tinkling in the background. Oh no, he’s not alone! Amanda has interrupted him with another woman!
- Oh, but a cute little girl comes to the door. Then another. As it turns out, Graham is a single dad to two adorable kids, Olivia and Sophie. Amanda asks, are you D-I-V-O-R-C-E-D? And nope!! Christmas movies are deceiving. He’s not a womanizer, he’s a widower!
- Graham says he loves Amanda. She doesn’t say it back. And then the doom gets worse when they can’t seem to get on the same page about whether to try a long-distance relationship.
- It’s time for Amanda to return to L.A. She gets into her chartered car and the driver asks her if she had a nice vacation. She says it was the best vacation she ever had, and tears fall down her cheeks, for the first time since she was 14.
- Realizing this means she loves Graham, she has the driver turn around and decides to stay for New Years.
Meanwhile in L.A.
- Iris arrives and runs around in amazement at how nice and big the house is.
- She notices a nurse out walking an elderly man with a walker. Later, she’s driving by and he looks lost. She offers to help Arthur home and he accepts. She walks him in and notices an Oscar statue. Her interest is piqued. Somewhere in there, he also tells her this is a really adorable meet-cute, a concept with which she is not familiar.
- She asks Arthur out for dinner and they start spending time together, not romantically (he is near 90 after all). He was a Hollywood writer and keeps feeding her a bunch of movies she needs to see, all featuring women with gumption.
- Meanwhile, a man shows up at Amanda’s door to pick up a laptop belonging to Amanda’s recent ex. His name is Miles and he is played by Jack Black and is much more age appropriate for Iris than Arthur is.
- Miles has a girlfriend but starts spending time with Iris and Arthur.
- Iris and Miles go to a video store to find movies Arthur wants her to watch and Miles (who works writing musical scores) loudly sings famous musical scores to all the great movies he sees. That is, until he sees his girlfriend walk by with another man. Not only was she cheating on him, but she was over the top lying about being out of town.
- Iris and Miles bond over their cheating exes.
- Iris brings Arthur his mail and sees him throw away something that looks important. Apparently, some Hollywood group wants to throw a tribute event in honor of Arthur’s work writing for the movies. Arthur doesn’t want anything to do with it because he doesn’t think anyone will come and he’s embarrassed to get on stage with his walker.
- Iris encourages Arthur to move forward with the event, assuring him that she’ll help him get in shape so he can walk without his walker. This is followed by scenes of them doing walking workouts in the pool, and Iris pushing Arthur’s walker away from him.
- Miles writes some music for when Arthur goes on stage, a theme song that sounds like Arthur. He needs to deliver it to the event, but first must go talk to his girlfriend who realizes she made a huge mistake by cheating on him. Will he and his cheating gf get back together? Will he and his music get to the event in time?
- Meanwhile Iris’ ex, Jasper surprises her by showing up at the door. He can’t live without her. But after it becomes clear that he’s still engaged to be married to someone else, Iris stands up to him and says that he’s been mistreating her for years and she’s not going to allow it to happen any longer. She realizes she is a woman with gumption, just like in all the movies Arthur had her watch!
- Iris gets dressed up to the nines and picks up Arthur for the tribute event. They walk into what appears to be a very quiet event hall, but when they enter the theater, there is not an empty seat in the house. Iris and Arthur walk up the aisle, no walker in sight.
- Arthur gets up the stairs to the stage without assistance and without even using the railing! He’s a spry old man. And guess what, his theme song played, so that means Miles made it in time! Arthur is triumphant, and the entire theater loves him.
- Miles takes a seat next to Amanda and they briefly kiss. Miles asks Iris out for NYE but oh no, Iris will be back in England. No worries, Miles decides to fly to England to spend New Years with Iris there. I guess that will be their first date? And Arthur isn’t invited?
Back in England:
It’s New Years Eve and Amanda and Graham are at Graham’s house with his daughters. Iris and Miles are also there. Amanda and Iris have met for the first time and appear to get along great. Everyone gets up and dances together. The newly formed couples dance romantically. And then the credits roll.
