The Holiday: December 8, 2006
80%

Amanda Woods (Cameron Diaz), the owner of a prospering advertising firm that creates movie trailers, lives in Southern California. Iris Simpkins (Kate Winslet) writes the popular wedding column for London’s Daily Telegraph and resides in a
charming cottage in the English countryside.

Though Iris and Amanda live 6,000 miles apart, they are in exactly the same place: Just before Christmas, Iris and Amanda decide to take a needed break from the men in their lives (played by Edward Burns and Rufus Sewell) — and neither is much in
the mood for a nostalgic chorus of “Auld Lang Syne.”

Amanda, wanting to get out of town for the holidays, stumbles onto an internet site
that specializes in home exchanges, and finds Iris’ English cottage to be the perfect
antidote to her troubles. On impulse, Amanda and Iris agree to crisscross continents
and move into each other’s homes for two weeks.

Iris lands in Los Angeles on a spectacularly clear day warmed by the gusts of the
seasonal Santa Ana winds. Not long after she arrives at Amanda’s Brentwood home,
she is befriended by Arthur (Eli Wallach), a noted screenwriter from Hollywood’s
Golden Era, and Miles (Jack Black), a film composer who works with Amanda’s exboyfriend.

In England, where it is anything but balmy, Amanda is just settling into the cozy
solitude of the snow-covered Rose Hill Cottage, when Iris’ handsome brother
Graham (Jude Law) comes knocking at the cottage door.

In an unexpected turn of events, both women discover that the best trips are the
ones where you leave your baggage behind.

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