CinemaCon got a preview of new movies from Ethan Coen and Alexander Payne

Focus Features brought the goods to CinemaCon. In addition to a new trailer from “the Marvel of specialty box office” Wes Anderson for Asteroid City and the trilogy capper My Big Fat Greek Wedding 3, Focus played trailers for Alexander Payne’s The Holdovers and Ethan Coen’s Drive-Away Dolls. Unfortunately, the studio didn’t release trailers publicly, but we can at least share what we saw.

Payne’s The Holdovers sees the director stepping back from the high-concept sci-fi satire of Downsizing, returning to high school for the first time since Election, and bringing back Paul Giamatti for the first time since Sideways. The brief clip looks like a throwback to 70s slice-of-life comedies, complete with heavy film grain that was very apparent on the giant screen at CinemaCon. The Holdovers follows a group of prep school students who don’t go home for Christmas and a disgruntled Paul Giamatti, sporting a constantly moving lazy eye, as a cranky teacher who goes too far in his verbal abuse of the kids. After telling a student (Dominic Sessa) that no one loves him, Giamatti discovers that the student’s father is dead. The pair strikes an unlikely friendship with the help of a school nurse played by Da’Vine Joy Randolph.