... or, the blandest Christmas story ever told. I don’t think I’ve rolled my eyes more over a 90 minute period in my life. Around the hour mark I was literally just willing it to end. And honestly, I was really looking forward to seeing this movie – not least since I can’t believe I’ve still not seen it after 16 years, even through my Now and Then phase when I wanted to see just about anything those four girls had ever been in.

The formulaic nature of the story – it’s basically an It Takes Two style masked-remake of Miracle on 34th Street, 3 years before the real deal hit the big screen – is a given. What really put a sour face on me is the lack of care in the basic message it tries to force down your throat: that divorce is pretty much the worst thing that can happen to a child, which – and don’t get me wrong, I know it’s still an ordeal – is frankly bullsh*t.

It takes a real fairytale-type stance on the idea of step-parents (or in this case, potential step-parents) – that they’re basically evil no matter what they do – and I’ll admit, as someone who really had a hard time adjusting to one of those at the age of 5, I’m among the first to revel in that treatment of such creatures. But the way it’s done here? The mother’s new prospective partner really isn’t a bad person at the start. You actually see him trying to be a good guy, like with the cherry in the ginger ale; he just happens to suck around children. There’s a better story here if that’s the character they wanted to show. He’s literally subjected to comically cruel punishment just because he’s gonna be a stepdad. And I don’t know, honestly I felt that sucked. Sure, he flies off the handle and damns himself at the 11th hour; but the way he’s dealt with initially just really turned me off. I don’t know, I’m sure some will be rolling their eyes at me after reading that but if you know me then you know I always say what I think of a movie, and that’s what this one made me think on this particular day.

Thora Birch is wonderful. Like honestly even better than I’d thought. The scene where she marches back to Macy’s with the giant white muff on her hands to “fix a mistake” is probably the best work she’s ever done as an actress. But sometimes, even a talented cutie isn’t enough to save what is essentially an overstretched babbling (in a bad way, I feel I need to stress following Say Anything…) pointlessness.

This entry was posted on Sunday, December 16th, 2007 at 11:27 pm in 2 hearts, Movie Reviews and tagged as Christmas, cuties. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.