Sometimes Christmas movies can be captivating, awe-inspiring affairs, such as when George C. Scott and Albert Finney played Ebenezer Scrooge in their respective adaptations of A Christmas Carol. Other times, Christmas movies become vehicles for removing the life support tubes of an actor’s career relevance, such as when Michael Keaton became a snowman in Jack Frost. Of course, there are other instances when Christmas movies are just a haphazard mess, like your company Christmas party.
Here are four examples of the latter. Also, I feel it is imperative to point out that if any of you are masochistic enough to see these films, spoilers exist in this article.
4. The Nativity Story (2006)
Director: Catherine Hardwicke
Starring: Keisha Castle-Hughes, Shohreh Aghdashloo, Oscar Issac
Company Christmas Party Equivalent: Peggy in accounting’s slurred karaoke rendition of “Silent Night.”
While Hardwicke is best known for taking stupid vampire books and turning them into stupid vampire movies, a sin for which she can never atone, 2006’s The Nativity Story is a 100 minute re-telling the same story for the 9 millionth time.
There is nothing that sets this movie apart from a Catholic school Christmas play. At the same time, though, it’s hard not to see why this story appealed to the director Hardwicke. It’s about a pregnant teenage girl going through hard times. Plot devices like that are kind of her bread and butter.
However, there is nothing special about this flick, as Keith Phipps at AV Club noted in his review:
“… a filmed Sunday-school lesson that favors a dry, by-the-Book approach over even a suggestion of dramatic interpretation. It’s more Christmas pageant than movie.”
3. Christmas With The Kranks (2004)
Director: Joe Roth
Starring: Tim Allen, Jamie Lee Curtis, Dan Aykroyd
Company Christmas Party Equivalent: When Toby from sales drunkenly knocks over the company Christmas tree and lights the HR filing cabinet on fire.
When it comes to Tim Allen, I much prefer to think that he mysteriously disappeared after the final episode of Home Improvement. Unfortunately, this is not reality, merely the desperation of a film junkie who watched a funny guy slip into the festering carbuncle of bad holiday movies. After all, The Santa Clause 3 should have never happened.
Christmas With the Kranks also should have never happened. What begins as a movie about parents who decide to forsake Christmas traditions in response to empty nest syndrome, becomes an all-out assault on choice. Luther and Nora Krank are practically vilified by their community for their decision to forgo Christmas. Hell, they’re even picketed by the kid who played Dewey in Malcolm in the Middle.
But, as with any movie whose main characters decide not to blow thousands of dollars on Christmas lights, the Krank’s ultimately choose not to go on vacation. Instead, Luther Krank learns the meaning of Christmas when his neighbor’s cancer comes back, because that’s obviously the only way this movie could have ended.
2. An American Carol (2008)
Director: David Zucker
Starring: Kevin Farley, Kelsey Grammer, Trace Adkins
Company Christmas Party Equivalent: When the employees find pictures of Debbie the Receptionist’s butt on the floor outside the copy room and realize she is shagging Clyde from HR.
While not a Christmas movie in the traditional sense (like taking place at Christmas), An American Carol borrows and bastardizes the same plot from A Christmas Carol and uses Chris Farley’s not-so-talented brother to do so.
Kevin Farley plays a Michael Malone, an extremely-biased caricature of Michael Moore, a cinematographer who seeks to abolish the 4th of July, because that’s totally something Michael Moore would do. Malone is visited by three spirits through which he is supposed to learn patriotism and the true meaning of America. The film is probably best described by Liza Schwarzbaum at Entertainment Weekly:
“.. a loony attack on wacko liberalism and a ding-dong defense of wacko conservatism.”
Also, Bill O’Reilly has a cameo as a right-wing blowhard.
1. Saving Christmas (2014)
Director: Darren Doane
Starring: Kirk Cameron, Darren Doane, Bridgette Ridenour
Company Christmas Party Equivalent: Kirk Cameron actually showing up to the company Christmas party.
From the man who brought us “the banana proves God is real” comes Saving Christmas, a film so horrible that, even though I not thought it possible, I became a stronger atheist. Cameron’s cleverly named Kirk teaches his cynical brother-in-law, the cleverly named Christian, that Christmas is Biblical in origin during a Christmas party.
Seriously, that’s practically the whole movie.
What makes this flick worse is the reaction to its negative press. The film was nominated for six Golden Raspberry awards, winning Worst Picture, Worst Actor (Cameron), Worst Screenplay (Darren Doane and Cheston Harvey), and Worst Screen Combo (Kirk Cameron and his ego).
On his Facebook page, Cameron begged his fans to help him “storm the gates of Rotten Tomatoes” by going to the website and rating it highly so they can send a message to critics. In response to this post, Internet users traveled to the website and gave the film unfavorable ratings. Three weeks after its theatrical release, the film became the lowest-rated film at the Internet Movie Database, prompting Cameron to lash out at “haters and atheists.”
It’s interesting to observe that Kirk Cameron was a better actor when spouting off cheesy one-liners with his friend Boner on Growing Pains than he was “putting the Christ back in Christmas” in this abhorrent abuse of cinema. Isn’t practice supposed to make someone better at their craft?
