Holes

Recommendation

I could go either way on this film when it comes to a recommendation. I think its plot and characters are well suited for child viewers which is probably why I remembered it so fondly. As an adult I’m not sure I would recommend watching it. Many of the characters are fairly one dimensional and aren’t always given enough time to interact with one another to earn the emotional payoffs that are set up.

I would recommend this as a rewatch if you have fond memories from watching it when you were younger. I would also recommend this to watch with younger relatives as I think works on a surface level and does introduce some interesting topics that aren’t present in a lot of other children’s media (at least when I was growing up I didn’t watch anything else that took place in jail).

Thoughts

Spoilers ahead …

Unsatisfying Resolutions

The falling action and conclusion of the film all felt rushed to me which I found this disappointing because the film does a good job of setting up a lot of interesting problems for the characters to deal with. I heard somewhere that in storytelling that it’s okay for bad things to happen for no reason, but people won’t accept good things happening for no reason. The ending of Holes is back-to-back scenes of good things happening for no reason.

Most of the difficulties that the character encountered throughout the film up to that point are magically resolved when the family curse is finally lifted. All of the misfortune that befalls Stanley is chalked up to the family curse and he accepts no responsibility for what happens to him. Likewise, after the curse is lifted his problems resolve themselves largely through luck. As a result Stanley’s character comes off as fairly passive.

Stanley’s family’s wealth and situation are fixed immediately when his father invents something to cancel out odor which they can sell. Importantly, he invented it by accident and cannot claim to have achieved it through skill. This results in the family being able to hire a lawyer who in turn is immediately able to get Stanley released. Stanley and Zero just happened to have eaten the onions which protect them from the yellow spotted lizards. It’s all just good luck and very little is earned by the characters.

Rewatching Movies as an Adult

This movie was much more connected than I realized when I watched it as a child. For example, I didn’t realize that Signourney Weaver’s character was related to the scummy rich guy who shot Sam. I also didn’t realize that the man who threatens to shoot Kate Barlow and the grandfather character are also all that same person. I didn’t realize that Zero was only being nice to Stanley because he felt bad for hitting him with the shoes. I never realized they called Stanley “Caveman” because he found the fossils.

There were so many not-insignificant plot points that were entirely lost on me as a kid. It makes me wonder how many movies there are from my childhood where I’ve missed important pieces of the plot. Many I probably won’t rewatch because I suspect that my opinion of them base on my memory is more favorable than it would be now.

Weird Scene at the End

There’s one scene that I remember being confused by as a child that I was still confused by now, albeit for different reasons. Near the end of the film, Stanley’s lawyer has returned with the police to get Stanley out of the camp. One of the officers notices Mr. Sir and arrests him for being in violation of his parole. Zigzag makes a gender normative remark about Mr. Sir’s real name which you can watch if you’re curious.

Obviously the joke is gender normative and arguably transphobic, but what I think makes the scene go from just distasteful to fully strange is Mr. Sir remarks, “It ain’t” which confuses me more. Additionally the rest of the kids all react to that remark with an “Ohhh” and someone even says, “Ok, Ok” which frames what he said as a comeback.

I’m not sure if it’s meant to be taken literally, but if so, does his character identify as a woman? If they are presenting Mr. Sir as someone who identifies as a woman then the entire framing takes a more transphobic slant in my opinion. I don’t think that is their intention, but it struck me as being a weird scene and I remember think the same thing when I was younger. At that time I was more confused why he agreed with the remark that was clearly intended to be derogatory, but didn’t consider it deeper than that.

Anyway, I think it’s just a poorly written scene, based on a low effort gender normative joke, but I’m trying to decide what is happening in the back half of that scene with Mr. Sir’s response and the crowd’s “oh”-ing.