Christmas Tagged Articles at Cinematical

On Christmas Day, Last Chance Harvey will go into limited release and give us a Christmas treat. The film stars Dustin Hoffman and Emma Thompson, and it's almost like seeing what would've happened if Stranger Than Fiction's Professor Jules Hilbert met and romanced Karen Eiffel. I always wonder what sort of romance could have blossomed between Jules and Karen, and since this is the holiday season, it got me thinking about characters who should reunite and deal with the holidays on the big screen.

The first that came to mind was Jesse and Celine -- our beloved Before Sunrise and Before Sunset characters. After Richard Linklater created a billowing, world-wide sigh with the ending of the second film, audiences have been itching to find out what happens next, so why not a thoughtful piece that takes place over the course of the holidays? It wouldn't work to add a million people into the mix, but I'm sure the pair would find a lot to say about Christmas, and maybe we could finally see how the pair survive in the real (albeit Santa-laced) world.

Beyond the realm of indie romance, can you imagine a certain Miles and Jack taking a New Years Eve trip back to wine country? Pineapple Express getting hidden in a Christmas gift? The Wonder Boys going on a new snow-filled adventure?

Are there any characters you would love to see in the holiday setting? Are any just perfect for dealing with a Winter Wonderland?

Enough with the same old lists of favorite holiday movies! Every year, I see the same entries, probably because there hasn't been a good Christmas movie in years. At least here at Cinematical we shake things up a bit and present you with our favorite Christmas horror, favorite Christmas action, favorite holiday musicals, favorite Christmas movies for Jews, favorites you probably haven't seen, favorite R-rated Christmas, Scrooge's favorites, least favorite obnoxious Christmas comedies and we have a guy who really hates the usual favorites, including A Christmas Story.

Last year we also had a list of non-Christmas movies set during Christmas. Somewhat similar to that, I present you with my favorite non-Christmas movies NOT set during Christmas. I know, that just defines any movie that isn't a holiday movie. I could pick ... Old School ... or The Hunt for Red October. But there's actually some logic here. On Christmas I like to avoid all true holiday movies, whether they are about Christmas, set at Christmas, make fun of Christmas, steal Christmas, blow sh*t up at Christmas, whatever. Yet there is enough holiday spirit in me to choose movies that could almost just barely be associated with Christmas, at least for me. So, if you're tired of It's a Wonderful Life, Gremlins, Home Alone, Santa Claus: The Movie, or whatever you normally watch today, try out one or seven of these:

My Neighbor Totoro (Hayao Miyazaki, 1988)

I've never been a big fan of Santa Claus as a character. If I had to reinvent Christmas I'd choose another large jolly figure that brings joy to young children: the Totoro, specifically the largest, O-Totoro/Miminzuku. He's kind of like Santa without the annoying "ho, ho, ho", and he's probably more fun to fly with (the Catbus is likely also more comfy than a reindeer-led sleigh). Sure, Totoro's origins are more Shinto than Christian, but isn't appropriation what Christmas is all about?


Brewster's Millions (Walter Hill, 1985)

Or is Christmas really all about consumerism? The Richard Pryor and John Candy version of George Barr McCutcheon's novel (also adapted in 1914, 1921, 1926, 1935, 1945 and 1961) is one of my favorite movies that both celebrates and scorns the idea of being rich and the act of spending money frivolously (Capra's Mr. Deeds Goes to Town is another). In the movie, Pryor is a minor league baseball player who inherits $30 million that he has to blow in 30 days, after which if he's successful at maintaining no assets or savings, he receives $300 million. Another fun Pryor comedy that would make for great holiday viewing is The Toy, in which he's bought by Jackie Gleason as a plaything for his son (but that one might be viewed as a tad too racist nowadays).

Wonderful as the classic family Christmas movies can be, the overwhelming sugary sweetness in most of them can be a little off-putting to adult audiences. I know my friends tend to gravitate more towards the R-rated holiday fare -- Die Hard, Bad Santa, The Ref, etc. Lord knows Hollywood doesn't want to be bothered coming up with original ideas, so I'm proposing seven remakes of Christmas family classics -- souped up for 2008 and aimed at the 17+ crowd. I've set up the plots and even suggested a possible director for each. Enjoy...

Michael Moore's A Christmas Carol

In Michael Moore's return to narrative filmmaking, George W. Bush plays with his shiny new train set, sets out cookies for Santa Claus, and falls asleep in his footie pajamas while watching Power Rangers. He is awoken in the middle of the night by The Ghost of Christmas Past, who takes Georgie through his days of frat parties, draft dodging, drunk driving, and cocaine abuse. Even faced with hard evidence, Bush denies any involvement. The Ghost of Christmas Present takes Bush deep into a post-Katrina New Orleans, where Bush cracks jokes and enjoys some caramel corn. Stunned by Bush's lack of feeling, the ghost takes him to Iraq, where he sees what Christmas is like for U.S. soldiers. Bush yawns. He is sleepy. The Ghost of Christmas Future shows Bush a world ravaged by the effects of global warming and America hated by countries all across the globe. "Not real concerned about my legacy, Future Dude" chuckles Bush, and he falls asleep safe in his bed. Bush wakes up twelve hours later, having learned absolutely nothing. As the movie ends, he runs over a homosexual couple with his truck and kicks a sick orphan in the face.

One of my favorite movies ever is Frank Capra's It's a Wonderful Life. When I was growing up, every holiday season my grandmother would scour the TV Guide for It's a Wonderful Life and White Christmas, and I'd sleep over at her house and we'd watch them together. This was back in the olden days before cable television, in the very early days of the VCR. My dad was an early-adopter of the VCR -- we had one of the very first $1,000 VCRs on our block -- but it took another decade or so for my grandma to trust those newfangled recording contraptions.

Back then, It's a Wonderful Life came on once a year, and if you missed it you were screwed. So my grandma and I would make sure we knew when it was on, and I'd cuddle up on her couch under the afghan, and she and I and my great-grandmother would watch George Bailey's life unfold again on the television screen.

In recent years, of course, we've been able to get more than our fill of It's a Wonderful Life as it's shown a lot more, and there have been a couple of versions released on DVD, but now we have the "Special Collector's Edition" two-disc collector's set.

I'm going to work from the assumption that I don't need to go into a great deal of detail here on the plot of the film: George Bailey (James Stewart), a nice guy who runs a savings and loan and has four kids with his lovely wife, Mary (Donna Reed). After some bad luck (aided and abetted by the local evil rich guy, Mr. Potter (Lionel Barrymore), with his savings and loan on the brink of collapse and under investigation, George makes a wish that he'd never been born -- and with the help of a bumbling angel named Clarence (Henry Travers), he gets to see just what the world would have been like without him.

Where do you think you're going? Nobody's leaving. Nobody's walking out on this fun, old-fashioned family Christmas! No, no. We're all in this together. This is a full-blown, four-alarm holiday emergency here! We're gonna press on, and we're gonna have the hap-hap-happiest Christmas since Bing Crosby tap-danced with Danny f**king Kaye. And when Santa squeezes his fat white ass down that chimney tonight, he's gonna find the jolliest bunch of a**holes this side of the nuthouse!

-- Clark W. Griswold (Chevy Chase)

After European Vacation, no one had any reason to believe the Vacation series would get back on track. Not to mention, almost without exception, movie series tend to get worse as they go along, right? Well, not this time.

National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation ranks just slightly behind the original in terms of laughs, and it packs in even more heart without resorting to schmaltz. Again, I'm going to give a lot of the credit to John Hughes, the sole writer this time out. He makes just about every line funny, memorable, and quotable. He gives us a whole lot of characters, each well-defined and amusing. Hughes may have hit his peak here unfortunately, because after the following year's Home Alone, the man never wrote a great script again. (I think Dutch is hilarious, but even with all my Hughes love I can't call it "good.")

It was a "last hurrah" of sorts for Chevy Chase, too. Chase is really terrific here in what is, I'm sad to say, his final funny starring role (although I didn't see The Karate Dog). Oh, Chevy. What happened? Beverly D'Angelo returns, and is typically great ("Clark! Slow down! I don't want to spend the holidays dead!"). And my Lord, does Randy Quaid step it up here as Cousin Eddie. Chase's exchanges with Quaid are some of the film's funniest moments ("Can I refill your eggnog for you? Get you something to eat? Drive you out to the middle of nowhere and leave you for dead?"). If Quaid's delivery of gems like "Merry Christmas! Sh*tter was full!" and "That's the gift that keeps on giving the whole year!" don't make you laugh, well ... lighten up.

The King of Kong is my favorite movie of the year so far, and one of my favorite documentaries of all time. It may be hard to find a theater showing the film where you are, but do anything in your power to see it. Seth Gordon, the director of that robo-excellent flick is rapidly becoming a pretty hot commodity in Hollywood. As Monika told you, he intends to direct a fictionalized version of Kong, with actors like Johnny Depp and Edward Norton on the filmmaker's wish list. He's attached to direct a project called The Only Living Boy in New York. And now The Hollywood Reporter has announced that Gordon is in final negotiations to direct Four Christmases, a holiday comedy with Vince Vaughn and Reese Witherspoon. I'm not sure how he's going to have time to do it all.

Four Christmases is based on a screenplay by first-timers Matt Allen and Caleb Wilson, and will follow a young married couple (Vaughn and Witherspoon), each half of which has divorced parents. They struggle to attend...you guessed it...four Christmas Day celebrations, one for each parent, and somehow maintain their sanity. Christmases has been in the works for several years. It was set up with an intended December 2004 release date, but went into turnaround when it conflicted with the release of the Tim Allen vehicle Christmas with the Kranks. Then Adam Shankman was scheduled to direct, but chose to do Hairspray instead. When he left, Shrek director Vicky Jenson came on board, but "a deal never materialized." So now we've got Gordon at the helm, and I couldn't be happier. If Christmas is half the film Kong is, I'll love the crap out of it.

Let me just start off by saying, I actually really like Vince Vaughn. But for some reason, the airbrushed, "kinder and gentler" Vaughn in the four new posters for the comedy Fred Claus is just creeping me out. The story centers on Vaughn as the no-goodnik brother of the Santa Claus, who tries to mend some familial rifts by helping out with the family business. Paul Giamatti plays the big guy in red, with Vaughn (obviously) as the black sheep in the family. The cast also includes Rachel Weisz, Miranda Richardson, and Kevin Spacey. Claus was directed by The Wedding Crashers', David Dobkin from a script by Dan Fogelman, and this is Dobkin's third film with Vaughn; their working relationship began back in 1998 with the black comedy Clay Pigeons, so they seem to enjoy working with each other.

Claus is set for release on November 9th, sandwiched between a couple of other high-profile family films -- Jerry Seinfield's Bee Movie, and Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium starring Natalie Portman and Dustin Hoffman. Last November, Erik had given us news of the teaser for Claus, and I will admit, it looked like it had the potential to be pretty funny. There were no actual scenes from the film mind you, but the deadpan shtick that Vaughn and Giamatti provided seemed like it might be an antidote to the toothless comedy of most holiday movies. Combined with the solid cast, and Vaughn and Dobkin's track record, I'm thinking maybe this won't be another lame holiday offering. Unfortunately, the elf/ninja joke showcased in one poster also has me thinking otherwise.

You've heard his voice a million times, and now you can actually see what he looks like. Don LaFontaine, who has provided the "This summer, one man fights injustice and tyranny ..." voiceovers for over 3,500 different projects appears in this video, along with a sleigh-load of other voiceover talent reading "The Night Before Christmas." Aside from the Blockbuster commercials a few years ago, and the bizarre yet funny short film Five Men and a Limo which was made for the 26th Annual Hollywood Reporter Key Art Awards from 1997 (that's a mouthful), you've probably never seen this guy's face.

Now's your chance to see him, Eddie Deezen, Dennis Haysbert, Jim Cummings and a load of other voice over actors (hey, you throw the voice of Pooh and Tigger into anything, and I'm a sucker for it) instead of just hearing them. They do a great job of it, and even throw in some Hanukkah cheer. After the jump, gather your friends and family around the warm glow of the computer screen, and let them soak in the wonderment of something you never see: the face of voiceover artists.

Well, the day has finally arrived and we here at Cinematical would like to wish you and yours a happy, healthy, film-inspired Merry Christmas. Should you be looking for something to read while the (turkey? ham? some other random meat?) is cooking in the oven, here's a recap of all the wonderful lists we've thrown together in honor of the holiday season. Enjoy! (Oh, and try not to eat too much.)

Cinematical's 12 Days of Cinematicalmas:

DVDs Your Kids Want, Even if They Don't Know It -- Says Kim: "Sure, there are a few gems here and there, but this Christmas/Hanukah/Kwanzaa/winter holiday of your choice, why not reach back a little into the past for some truly great children's films that your kids may not even know enough about to put on their wish list?"

The World's Most Obnoxious Xmas Comedies -- Says Scott: "So anyway, the Deck the Halls trailer reminded me -- hey, there's been a whole BUNCH of really rotten Christmas comedies over the past few decades! At least seven, anyway! Which brings us to the list; all naughty, no nice."

Documentary Box Sets to Add to Your Christmas List -- Says Christopher: "When it comes to movies, single-title DVDs just aren't going to cut it. Criterion editions are almost there, but not quite. No, for your present demands, you need something bigger, like a box set."

Essential Home Theater Gifts for the Film Buff -- Says Chris: "If you watch movies at home and want to maximize the "cinematic experience" of those movies, following are some essential tools that will help you get there."

Seven Things You Didn't Know About It's A Wonderful Life -- Says James: "Here are seven things you may not know about the Frank Capra / Jimmy Stewart classic, from where it began to its reverberations in the here and now."

Movies to Wrap Presents By -- Says Jette: "I'm very fond of putting on a movie in the background while I'm wrapping presents. The idea is that the movie should be something I've seen before, so I am not tempted to put down the scissors and ribbons and watch closely."

Non-Christmas Movies Set During the Holiday Season -- Says Jeffrey: "Sometimes a movie simply set during the holiday season can weave Christmas into its storyline without making an overt holiday statement, and these can evoke a warmth and nostalgia -- or sometimes the opposite -- of their own."

If you are the kind of person who gets a little sick of all the good cheer at this time of year, then you just might be in the mood for a little more "coal in your stocking." That is when the downer Christmas movie gets its chance to shine. Most holiday flicks are all about making you feel good about family and Christmas and all that good stuff, but some films decide to go the other route and make you feel so damn awful about what you're watching that suddenly a burnt turkey and a family fight at the dinner table don't seem so bad.

Here are some of what I think are the most depressing holiday movies. If nothing else, at least they remind us it could always get worse. ...

One Magic Christmas (1985)
This movie is all about the guilt. In a long line of films that are meant to make you feel guilty about all of the overspending and extravagance of the holidays, One Magic Christmas stands out. It follows a poor family with no hope of a Christmas in sight, as the mom (Mary Steenburgen) works too hard and has lost her joy in the season. Sure enough, a Christmas angel (in the creepy form of Harry Dean Stanton) shows her the error of her ways. Throw in the extra plot lines of a kidnapping, a shooting and a drowning, and you have yourself one heck of a depressing Christmas flick.