 hile
I have not seen this movie, and sincerely hope I never do, I blogged
about it a few times, and those entries are archived below.
November
26, 2004
Christmas
with the Kranks looks like an amiably-idiotic Xmas comedy; not a
movie I would ever consider seeing, but something that bored,
holiday-weary families can probably suffer through without too much
pain. At least that's what I thought from the mediocre slapstick of the
trailer; an impression that was immediately banished by the reviews.
Almost all of which are extremely negative. It's at an
impressively-horrible 2%
on RT, with 2 positive reviews out of the 81 now listed.
I would not kick this particular dead horse, except that I made my
semi-regular tour of our
favorite lunatic's movie reviews, and saw that Mr. CAP Alerts had
been a busy little movie-goer, and had added half a dozen reviews since
I'd last checked
his site. None of them are any good, and by "good" I mean
none of them have any bizarre CAP Alerts universe comments.
Well, that's not entirely true, his review of Shall
We Dance opens with a full page of anti-gay ranting, and while
that's nothing unusual for Mr. CAP Alerts... there's nothing gay in the
movie he's ranting about! Reading (well, skimming over) his opening
obsessed lecture, I expected him to launch into a scathing attack on
some gay characters in the Richard Gere/JLo film; but all he says is
that there are "homosexual references." And really, what sort
of pseudo-ballroom dancing film would it be without them?
In the end, I'm puzzled not by his anti-gay hysteria, since he always
has that, but why on earth he chose Shall We Dance as the review to
voice them in. Why not save the thunder for a movie with I dunno...
actual gay people?
That aside, the most remarkable thing about his
Christmas with the Kranks review is what he doesn't remark upon. His
review begins with a predictable opening paragraph in which he decries
the absence of sufficient Jesus references in the film, and then he hits
gloriously oblivious stride with the next one.
But Christmas with
the Kranks, based on the original novel, "Skipping
Christmas" by John Grisham, is not without some good warm-n-fuzzy
feelings. Feelings of togetherness as a community. Unselfish
sacrifice. A community which builds traditions together. A community
which supports each other when tragedy or mishap strikes in spite of
their little day-to-day social battles.
Sounds fair enough... until you read a few professional reviews of
the film, and notice that critic after critic is spending multiple
paragraphs pointing out the deeply creepy conformity and fascistic
nature of the townsfolk... exactly the thing that Mr. CAP Alerts lauds
as wholesome community togetherness.
Don't believe me? Here are a few quotes, and I picked these virtually
at random from the major critic reviews listed on RT.
Rober
Ebert:
It's a holiday movie
of stunning awfulness that gets even worse when it turns gooey at the
end. And what is it finally so happy about? Why, that the Kranks'
neighbors succeed in enforcing their lockstep conformity upon them.
They form a herd mentality, without the mentality.
...
As a satire against
neighborhood conformity, "Christmas With the Kranks" might
have found a way to be entertaining. But no. The reasonable Kranks are
pounded down by the neighbors, and then their daughter decides, after
having been away only about two weeks, to fly home for Christmas with
her new Peruvian fiancι. So the Kranks of course must have their
traditional Christmas Eve party after all, and the third act consists
of all the neighbors pitching in to decorate the house, prepare the
food and decorations, etc., in a display of self-righteous cooperation
that is supposed to be merry but frankly is a little scary. Here's an
idea: Why don't the Kranks meet Blair and her fiance in Miami and go
on the cruise together?
The movie's complete
lack of a sense of humor is proven by its inability to see that the
Kranks are reasonable people and their neighbors are monstrous. What
it affirms is not the Christmas spirit but the Kranks caving in. What
is the movie really about? I think it may play as a veiled threat
against nonconformists who don't want to go along with the majority
opinion in their community. What used to be known as American
individualism is now interpreted as ominous. We're supposed to think
there's something wrong with the Kranks. The buried message is: Go
along, and follow the lead of the most obnoxious loudmouth on the
block.
Jami
Bernard of the NY Daily News:
The witchhunt against
the Kranks mounts, led by ringleader Dan Aykroyd. The couple cowers
indoors while enduring protesters massed outside and anonymous phone
calls.
We are supposed to
shed a tear of joy when the Kranks do a U-turn and anxiously try to
buy and scam their way back into Christmas at the last minute. Only
then do their neighbors act with decency.
If the Kranks are
harassed for not putting a jolly snowman on their roof, imagine what's
in store for any non-Christian who happened to wander into this
movie's gulag. That is the obvious subtext of "Christmas With the
Kranks" - worship our way or suffer the consequences.
A caroler nearly has
a heart attack when she sees one dark house on a block otherwise
lighted like a stage set. She lowers her voice as she imagines the
worst: "Are they Jewish? Muslim? Buddhist?" Horrors!
The movie is a
reminder of other groups who have been unwelcome at times in American
history. When the locals pound a threatening wooden sign into the
Kranks' lawn, it is an unfortunate reminder of wooden crosses on other
lawns past.
Robert
Wilonsky of the Dallas Observor:
They're suburban
automatons dressed in dull shades of muddy browns and smoke-stained
yellows, pale schmucks who buy their tans in mall kiosks, uptight and
overweight empty-nesters married to skinflint pricks. With their roofs
adorned by life-size snowmen, their homes trimmed with thousands of
sparkling lights, their guts full of booze guzzled on Christmas Eve,
they fetishize Christmas and all its accoutrements and damn anyone who
thinks of December 25 as just another day on the calendar. God help
the poor Hebrew or Hindu who moves into this neighborhood; I
half-suspect they'd wake up with a burning cross on their front lawn.
This is Big Studio's
hateful version of suburbia, a drab place where people dress alike,
think alike, look alike and act alike, to the point of abhorring
anyone who would revolt against the norm. A case could be made for
satire, if only Christmas With the Kranks at all sympathized
with its rebels. But instead it's a celebration of conformity, a film
that begs for laughs by mocking and ridiculing anyone who harbors an
original thought or action. It makes its dissenters out to be dopes
and cheapskates, Scrooges dishing out ill will as others dole out
their good tidings with plasticine grins that come to resemble smug
sneers.
Stephen
Hunter of the Washington Post:
Bad decision, Mr. and
Mrs. Krank. You forgot to count on the fascistic conformism of your
fellow Americans. You forgot to figure on the insidious and wrathful
pressures your friends and neighbors would bring to bear on you for
your apostate behavior. Why, consider yourself lucky not to end up on
stakes, frying in the night as Puritans dance about shrieking to drive
away your witch-spirits.
...
You can see where
it's going from the previews. No one is officially allowed to hate
Christmas in entertainment culture, so of course a big reversal, very
much like Scrooge's, is mandated. And, ho hum, it comes upon a
Christmas clear, trailing treacly bonhomie and fake cheer. Ugh.
Everyone in the film is mean-spirited, manipulative and repulsive, and
I'm only talking about the women! The men are much worse, particularly
Dan Aykroyd as a venal self-appointed community leader who leads a
campaign, including physical intimidation, against the Kranks. What
America is this? Haven't the filmmakers ever walked down neighborhood
streets where Catholics and Jews and Hindus and Presbyterians -- well,
not Presbyterians -- live next to each other, without rancor or
anguish over the differing holiday traditions? In fact, in its
distance from today's reality, "Christmas With the Kranks"
feels set in the vise of the '50s, when you toed the line or you went
on the list.
One or two reviewers decrying this movie as a fascist nightmare of
conformity might seem over the top and nutty... but when all of them
do it, you've got to wonder if they have a point? I'm certainly not
going to sit through the whole damn movie to find out, so feel free to
email me about it if you find yourself unable to avoid the film this
holiday season.
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