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Showing posts with the label 2024

Christmas Eve in Miller's Point (2024)

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Easily one of the most polarizing Christmas movies in recent history, Christmas Eve in Miller's Point can be viewed as either a masterpiece of atypical narrative structure, or as a failed experiment. The problem I'm running into is I can't decide which side of that line I fall on. I find it a little easier to address the more pressing question most of you likely have: whether or not you should watch it. The answer is almost certainly not... unless you're a diehard cinephile, that is. Just to be on the safe side, let's get the spoiler warning out of the way. This is, after all, a new movie, and its fans absolutely adore it (with good reason, I think). I'm still trying to sort out where my opinion falls, but I don't want to spoil the story of a movie this controversial without giving you a chance to make up your own mind. So, just to be clear, if you're still reading after this sentence, you're doing so with the knowledge you're about to have the s...

Adult Swim Yule Log 2: Branchin' Out (2024)

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Like its predecessor, the second Adult Swim Yule Log movie takes a lot of risks. But while this is ultimately a solid comedy/horror (leaning a lot more towards comedy this time), those risks don't pay off to anywhere near the same degree. It's probably unfair to expect otherwise, though: the first installment in this franchise felt revolutionary and exciting, essentially materializing a horror film from literal smoke. Even those of us not lucky enough to stumble on it organically when it aired advertised as a literal Yule Log video could sense the energy and excitement. That's just not here this time. While the movie has some very good and fairly original ideas, it ultimately feels much more conventional. This is a campy Christmas horror movie in the vein of Jack Frost (with the caveat I enjoyed this much more). It's got some practical creature and gore effects, an interesting premise exploring genre signifiers as a metaphor for trauma, and another good performance fro...

Sugarplummed (2024)

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I find myself using the word "frustrating" a lot when talking about Hallmark Christmas movies and the adjacent genre they inhabit. In this case, I'm using it in a somewhat favorable light, as what's frustrating is the disconnect between the stuff that works and the stuff that doesn't. This starts out as a pretty serviceable comedy and maintains that for a little more than half its runtime before, well... we'll get to that. First, a little about what Sugarplummed is. Or even better, what it isn't. I'm seeing a number of sites list this as a romance, which is just plain wrong. Bizarrely wrong, in fact, to the point I find myself wondering if those categorizing it as such actually watched past the Hallmark logo. While the main character's relationship with her husband goes through a rough patch, it's all part of her strained relationship with her family, all of which is secondary to the central relationship at the core of this story: her friendshi...

Red One (2024)

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Red One may be the most perfect encapsulation of its time, and I mean that in an almost entirely negative way. Elements of this movie are, I'd argue, quite good. There are some solid ideas and interesting choices made throughout. But the misguided direction and cinematography, egregious structural issues, and comically large budget represent a unique sort of production alchemy that could only exist in a world where streaming companies rely on a combination of algorithms and desperation to churn out what they hope will be massive, attention-grabbing films capable of pulling in subscribers. And the fact this was greenlit on the tail end of that dying philosophy, resulting in Red One receiving a theatrical window just long enough for it to bomb before crashing with little fanfare on the streaming service that commissioned it, is perhaps the final and most appropriate tribute to the era it hails from. Taken outside of this context, it's a truly baffling film that tries to combine k...

The Christmas Quest (2024)

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I don't expect we'll watch a lot of Hallmark movies this season (nothing against the company; we just have too much else on our plate), but The Christmas Quest promised a premise too interesting to pass up. The gimmick this time was to fuse the usual romantic comedy with a National Treasure/Romancing the Stone/Indiana Jones style fantasy/adventure treasure hunt set in Iceland based loosely on folklore surrounding the Yule Lads (a group of Icelandic trolls who have become somewhat analogous to Santa as their more monstrous aspects became subdued over the centuries). That's certainly the kind of thing that gets our attention. Sadly, the premise turned out to be much more interesting than the movie itself. As is often the case with Hallmark productions, the genre elements wind up feeling superficial: they drop in a handful of casual references, but when push comes to shove this is a Hallmark Christmas flick to the core. There's no real danger, no suspense, no excitement......

That Christmas (2024)

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If That Christmas had been released a decade ago, it would probably have performed modestly at the box office, sold well on DVD, gone into circulation on television and streaming, and be on its way to becoming a holiday classic. It's not reinventing the wheel, but it's the right mix of sweet, funny, and somber that makes for a fantastic experience that stays with you. This is really good stuff, with inspired voice casting and beautiful animation. But this wasn't made a decade ago, nor was it made five years ago, when the Disney/Fox merger threw production and release plans into disarray. So, here we are in 2024, when it's become pretty common for things like this to get picked up by Netflix and subsequently forgotten. Critics aren't enthusiastic about this one, either, so it's unlikely this will get much of a boost during awards season. Hell, we'll be lucky if this ever gets a blu-ray release (though if it does you can bet your ass I'll be buying a copy)...

Toy Review: Fresh Monkey Fiction Naughty or Nice, Wave 2: Nasty Krampus

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I'm continuing my look at a handful of figures from the second wave of Fresh Monkey Fiction's "Naughty or Nice" line of holiday action figures. Today, I'm reviewing "Nasty Krampus," and I'm going to start with what's probably my largest complaint in the review: I'm not crazy about that name. Does that matter? Not at all! But still, it feels like a rather dull descriptor for what's a pretty exceptional toy.  Naming conventions aside, this combines the  Krampus head, hands, and tail from Wave 1  with the naked torso used on the Wave 2 Barbarian Santa (no judgement: creative reuse is the name of the game when it comes to action figures). I don't have much to say about the individual components I haven't said before: everything looks great up close. I slightly prefer the paint on the first wave face, where the horns were a lighter color, but that's personal taste (and I'm really stretching to find something to nitpick here). O...

Toy Review: Fresh Monkey Fiction Naughty or Nice, Wave 2: Barbarian Santa

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Last year I looked at four figures from the first wave of Fresh Monkey Fiction's "Naughty or Nice" line of Christmas   themed action figures . As a reminder, these are 6-inch collectable toys in a similar style to the Marvel Legends or Star Wars Black lines. As someone who's quite literally been waiting decades for a toy company to realize there was a market for this sort of thing, I was elated. While those reviews were running, I was waiting on three figures I'd preordered the year before from the second wave. These were originally expected before Christmas, but their arrival got pushed back a few months due to issues shipping them overseas. Today, I'm going to be looking at "Barbarian Santa," the only Deluxe figure I picked up this year. In this line, "Deluxe" mainly means the figure comes with more or better accessories, though I'm not convinced that's really the case here, as I'll discuss in more depth when I get to that s...

The Merry Gentlemen (2024)

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The Merry Gentlemen is essentially a Hallmark Christmas movie with a premise Hallmark would never touch: a Broadway dancer in a Rockettes analog returns home to the small town where she grew up, then uses her abilities to save her family's pub by producing a show consisting of male strippers (and she finds love in the process, but you already assumed that). It's no surprise Netflix picked this one up - in addition to being less adverse to risqué subject matter, they've been pushing the "high-concept Christmas romcom" angle even more aggressively than Hallmark recently. And with good reason - there's a shocking volume of these coming out every year, and offering up content with a provocative description is an effective way to garner attention and views. And "Hallmark Christmas Magic Mike" is certainly attention grabbing. Speaking of which, I should probably acknowledge that I haven't actually seen the Magic Mike movies. I did see The Full Monty a ...