Mainlining Christmas

Before I start, I want to take a moment and discuss what I find utterly incomprehensible - it is likely not what you think it is. For example, as strange as it is that Sanrio, the Japanese company best known for Hello Kitty, produced a 1979 stop-motion fantasy movie re-imagining the Nutcracker as a dark fantasy in the vein of Oz and Wonderland, it's not incomprehensible. What my rational mind cannot accept is the idea that this was made, shown in America with an audio track starring Christopher Lee as Drosselmeyer, and then was inexplicably forgotten. Why isn't this at least as well knows as Rudolph's Shiny New Year? It's ten times as batshit crazy. The plot stays relatively close to the original story; closer, in some respects, than Tchaikovsky. That said, there are some major deviations. For example, neither E.T.A. Hoffmann's Nutcracker or Tchaikovsky's involved time-travel. However, it's worth noting the addition actually cleans up the narrative

Here's a quick quiz for you: How do you feel about: Old-School Movie Musicals?  A: Love 'em B: Like some C: Meh Broadway Musicals?  A: Love 'em B: Like some C: Meh Feminist Themes? A: All kinds, all the time, it's even okay if they're slightly awkwardly handled B: Passing the Bechdel Test is good C: Only when impeccably researched/in documentaries Angela Lansbury?  A: Goddess of theater and film B: She's pretty great C: I only like her most of the time Give yourself two points for every A , one for every B , an extra four points if you have a daughter younger than 12 who would answer A on two or more of the questions, and an extra point for every one of these names you recognize: Jerry Herman, Bob Mackie, Rob Marshall, Mark Saltzman. If you score 8 or more, see this film. (My score is 11 out of a possible 16.) That's a long way of saying that this movie may not be great cinema, but it can have a lot of appeal to a partic

We've never bothered writing up this movie, because - first and foremost - it's a New Year's movie, not a Christmas one. I don't want to get into the full debate here over whether or not New Year's is functionally just an extension of Christmas - I think that's worth more exploration another time - in part because it's ultimately irrelevant. Whether or not New Year's pieces belong here, the majority of Ghostbusters II is set right before the holidays, and thus deserving of discussion. The movie itself is somewhat controversial. Most die hard Ghostbusters fans despise it, and it's not hard to see why. The movie essentially retreads the premise and most of the story beats of part one. In fact, here's a synopsis for either film: Three paranormal scientists (and Winston) are down on their luck and can't catch a break until dark forces rise up and they're the only ones who can stop them. Meanwhile, Venkman, the team's clown, st

It was awful. I mean, we expected awful. It's called "Bratz Babyz Save Christmas," and it's a sequel to a direct-to-video movie based on a toy line spun off of another toy line that was essentially a knock-off of Barbie: this was never going to be brilliant film making. But we weren't ready. I'm not sure anyone could have been ready. I'm going to do my best to prepare you, in case you're foolish enough to try and watch this yourself, but the task of trying to depict in words the experience we just endured is a daunting one. This thing, on all levels, in all ways... it was awful. Based on the four minutes I was willing to invest researching this, it seems to be the third movie in the CG Bratz Babyz direct-to-the-dumpster-behind-Best-Buy-because-no-one-was-actually-stupid-enough-to-buy-the-video series. Did I mention it was awful? It was. Let's start with the animation. You know how crappy attempts to create CG humans result in a doll-like qu

We live in a strange world. It turns out there was a Watership Down animated series that ran for thirty-nine episodes between 1999 and 2001, including a two-part Christmas episode. First, some background. The novel, Watership Down, is a seminal work of epic fantasy starring rabbits in the British countryside. If you're unfamiliar with the story, you may think the premise sounds humorous, but it's a tale of prophecy, war, death, and legend. The book functions as a meditation on mythology, exploring how the rabbits' society is built on the tales it tells. Without it, it's unlikely we ever would have gotten Redwall, Mouse Guard, or numerous other fantasy stories about animals at war. Watership Down was adapted into an animated movie in 1978. This one goes on a list with Secret of NIMH and The Last Unicorn of animated features that traumatized kids in the 70's and 80's. The Watership Down movie didn't pull many punches: rabbits literally tore each other

This Disney short was originally supposed to be part of a 2006 version of Fantasia that Disney abandoned. This segment was produced anyway, and we saw it as part of the Disney Short Film Collection. It's a surpisingly faithful adaptation of Hans Christian Anderson's short story of the same name, even incorporating the original visions of the Match Girl as she freezes to death in the cold. Good times, all around. The original story makes it clear that the events transpire on New Year's Eve, though the girl hallucinates a Christmas tree. This short seems to have shifted the story to Christmas itself, as evidenced by her watching a family climb into a sleigh with a handful of wrapped gifts. The story is relatively bare bones: a poor girl fails to sell matches. Ignored by the world around her, she retreats into an alley, where she lights her matches and sees beautiful visions in the fire. The last light to go out is her own, when her grandmother's spirit whisks her

Call Me Claus is a made-for-TV movie about an aging Santa Claus recruiting a home-shopping network executive to take his place. The concept, as these things go, could have been worse. The execution really couldn't have been. The executive is played by Whoopie Goldberg, and Nigel Hawthorne plays the old Santa. This was Hawthorne's last role: he passed away a few weeks after this premiered. It's really hard not to make a joke right now. The movie opens in 1965. A young girl asks a mall Santa to bring her father, who's serving in the military, home for Christmas. He waffles, but lets the kid try on his hat. The hat glows, but no one notices. When the girl returns home, a pair of army officers are waiting to give her mother some bad news. This entire sequence was shot with all the emotional resonance of an online tax tutorial. Maybe less, now that I think about it. The story jumps ahead to the present day. Well, it jumps to 2001, which used to be the present d

Okay, we already watched the Christmas episode in season three . Here's the rest of them.   A Girl and Her Cat (1996) First we have to backtrack to episodes in seasons one and two. In this episode Salem throws a hissy fit (pun intended), stays out to make the family worried, and ends up catnapped by a little boy who wants a pet. There's a painfully obnoxious montage in this one as well, as Sabrina and her aunts (Hilda and Zelda) search for Salem. The highlights are references to Salem's backstory (he was originally human, but turned into a cat for trying to take over the world), and a scene where Sabrina steals Salem back by dressing as Santa and teleporting into the kid's closet, knowing no one will believe him. Also, Coolio has a cameo as a poster brought briefly to life. Oh, if you've never seen this show, you might not know that Salem is played at times by a truly ugly puppet cat and at times by a real cat. It's very strange. Sabrina Claus (1997)

I watched this show back when it aired, and I remember enjoying it. So, it's true, you can never go home again. This incredibly long-feeling half hour had a unnecessarily complicated plot. I'm going to sum up. Sabrina, being a teenager, isn't feeling the whole happy-family Christmas vibe Her aunts decide to double down on cheesy Christmas activities Cue montage that starts funny and goes on too long Sabrina is invited to a Christmas Eve party in the magical realm She goes, only to find out that it's an anti-Christmas party about mocking the holiday (The fact that she doesn't seem to know anyone there doesn't make much sense either.) She stops them from spying on and mocking people celebrating on Earth and storms out Only to discover that she has inadvertently deleted the holiday entirely She tries to convince people to remember Christmas Cue montage that doesn't start funny, only goes on too long She finally visits Santa/Father Christmas,

Lindsay unearthed three Rankin/Bass stop-motion Christmas specials we'd never reviewed (or heard of, for that matter), all of which were available on a single DVD. Naturally, we ordered the damn thing. Not surprisingly, there's a reason we've never heard of it. Pinocchio's Christmas is a bizarrely warped mashup of several early scenes from the Adventures of Pinocchio and the usual Rankin/Bass Christmas tropes. The story starts out with Pinocchio learning about Christmas from Geppetto, who sells his boots to buy his son a math book. Pinocchio promptly sells the math book, planning to use the money partly on himself and partly to buy his dad a Christmas present. But first he comes across the Fox and the Cat, who convince him the coins will grow into a tree of gold if he buries them. Naturally, he falls for this, and they steal the money. With the exception of the Christmas elements, this section is actually pretty accurate to the original, at least accor

As a rule of thumb, when there's an episode we're recommending that's embedded in the middle of a series, we advise watching it in context to get the needed background. This is different. We watched the first three episodes of The Librarians, and we think you're better off skipping to the Christmas episode. It's not that the earlier episodes were bad; it's more that they are generic as hell. They feel like an uninspired fusion of Doctor Who, Leverage, Warehouse 13, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, the X-Files... hell, basically every genre show of the past two decades shoved into a blender. The result comes off as mediocre in every possible way. Then along comes the Christmas episode, guest starring Bruce Campbell as Santa Claus, and the quality spikes. Story-wise, it's pretty generic Christmas fantasy stuff. The episode opens with Santa abducted by the Serpent Brotherhood (I promise, you're better off not having seen their first episode), a secret

The Swan Princess Christmas is the third of four direct-to-video sequels to The Swan Princess, a movie which failed to make ten million dollars during its entire theatrical run and has a Rotten Tomatoes score of 44%. This is the first and only installment of the franchise I've ever seen, so I can't attest whether the abysmal writing, direction, and animation were par for the course, or if this fails to live up to the series's pitiful legacy. Assuming Wikipedia is right, this was the first in the series to be computer animated. For the majority of this movie's run time, the plot is essentially incomprehensible. The two leads, Derek and Odette, are getting ready to spend their first Christmas together. They have three talking animal sidekicks who almost never interact with them: a puffin, a turtle, and frog trying to get women to kiss him. And there's a cat who's working with the ghost of the villain from the first movie. To get a Christmas tree, Derek goes

After some careful consideration, Lindsay and I agree that Krampus is our second favorite dark comedy/horror/fantasy movie released this year that features the famous Christmas demon. To be fair, there was some stiff competition . Honestly, Krampus is only nominally comedy or horror - I'd describe the film as a fairy tale before referring to either of those genres. And fairy tale is where Krampus's strength lies: it's a fantasy about Christmas magic and the darker implications of that concept. In realizing this side of the holidays, the movie employs some amazingly beautiful visuals. When we first set eyes on Krampus, we're too busy staring in awe to be afraid. Which doesn't mean there aren't some jump scares and the like. But there's less horror than wonder, even when the things on screen are anything but friendly. The movie opens somewhat gratuitously on dramatized imagery of shoppers battling each other for sales. It's here both to establish t

I am not a fan of Grumpy Cat. I know that the cat is fine, healthy, and as happy as you can consider a cat to be, but I find the actual cat off-putting because of the same physical differences that have made her an internet star. I am a fan of the smart people who are making lots of money off their mutant cat. You do you, and put your kids through school. Congrats. I’m proud of my maturity that I can say that, even after watching this…. thing. Grumpy Cat’s Worst Christmas Ever is “of the moment” in the worst possible way. The filmmakers plainly knew that not a single person would care about this movie in six months, and so they stuffed it full of in-jokes and winking, nodding references to the meme, internet culture, and the movie’s own stupidity. I’m not talking subtle, here; I’m talking the cat asking the camera “Why are you still watching?” The problem is that constantly calling out the fact that the movie is stupid doesn’t actually A) make it somehow not stupid or B) absolv

Yup, this might be another year for versions of the Nutcracker. This one is now our favorite. If you’re going to watch a film of a ballet, skip this boring one , and this better, but still dull one and probably even this one in favor of The Hard Nut. This production does suffer from the same problem that plagues almost all attempts to film a live performance: the person choosing the shot sometimes chooses the most boring part of the stage, or hides a transition that would actually be interesting to watch, or focuses on one character when something interesting is happening across the stage as a whole. This film version was produced for PBS in 1991, and the intro pieces with choreographer Mark Morris are clearly a bit dated. That said, the design, story and energy of this version lifts it well above others we’ve seen. The first act, especially, is glorious, in no small part due to the marvelous design. The style is based on the cartoonist Charles Burns; it uses strong black and

That, that was a thing that we sat through. Erin swears that he doesn’t remember why it was on our Netflix DVD queue. After watching it, we agreed that evidence suggests it was on some ‘worst holiday movies’ list. I thought it wasn’t going to be much from the opening credits, frankly, but the acting in this movie ended up being truly remarkable. The acting, the writing, the special effects and the production values: all of these were at a level that is hard to describe. I’ll try, though. Picture a bunch of fifth graders who have been brought up in a room with no contact with the outside world. They only learned about how people behave from two sources: only the most cliche and flat television from the 40’s and 50’s, and from one adult who has kind of a sadistic vibe. These kids write, direct, design and act in a holiday play. This is that play. The acting isn’t just wooden, it takes wooden to a whole new level of flat and unbelievable. It’s actually almost enough to believe it’

In 1985, I was six years old, Family Ties was my favorite show on television, mostly because of Michael J. Fox's Alex Keaton. Re-watching a few episodes three decades later, I can't really tell why I liked the show all that much, though Fox's deliveries seem to be the highlight. The show's premise revolved around a couple of liberal ex-hippies raising kids who were more in tune with 80's materialism and conservative politics. As a meditation on the power of the instinct to rebel, even when that means rebelling against the very concept of rebellion, I'd expect them to have enough material to fill two or three hours. The fact this show lasted seven seasons (including the three holiday episodes below) plus a made-for-TV movie doesn't bode well for its watchability. A Christmas Story (1982) : This episode starts on Christmas Eve while the Keatons are getting ready to drive to a ski lodge for the holiday. A blizzard forces them to change those plans, and

It's a competitive race, but "Last Christmas" has at least got to be in the running as the least rational, most bizarre episode of Doctor Who produced since the show was restarted in 2005. It's essentially a mashup of Aliens, Inception, and The Thing. With Santa Claus. The Jolly Old Elf is played by Nick Frost, who might be the single best named actor to ever take on the role. He does a fantastic job with it, too, embracing the absurdity of a fantasy character showing up on a science fiction show. The opening focuses on Clara, still grieving, rushing to her roof to investigate a loud crash. She discovers Santa Claus and two elves trying to corral their flying reindeer. The TARDIS shows up in the middle of this, and The Doctor appears to trade barbs with Santa before taking Clara away. They soon arrive at the North Pole, where they discover a group of scientists dealing with an alien outbreak. The aliens, called Dream Crabs, are drawn to people who are thinking