Deck The Halls

Matthew Broderick sucks but this movie doesn't.

Director: John Whitesell
Writers: Chris Ord
                Matt Corman
                Don Rhymer
Run time: 1hr 30minutes

Plot: The Finch family get some new neighbours who Steve (Matthew Broderick) sees as a threat to his perfect Christmas plans, especially when Buddy (Danny DeVito) decides he wants to be recognised for something.

Did you ever watch the live action version of How The Grinch Stole Christmas? Of course you have, for some reason that one is a classic staple of everyone's Christmas movie list, that's beside the point. Do you remember the scene where Martha May Whovier (Christine Baranski) is absolutely just one-upping Betty Lou Who (Molly Shannon)'s Christmas lights? So did the writers of this film. They remembered how truly hilarious that scene was, wrote a script around the idea and thought that this hilarity should be fronted by Matthew Broderick and Danny DeVito. Now I'm not a huge fan of Broderick, he's just boring to watch and hi voice does my head in, and I've got nothing against Danny DeVito, I'm just not a fan of his stuff, but this film actually isn't all that bad. If I'm flicking through the channels and I see it, I put it on. It's a fun little film, even if it is full of problems. What are the problems I don't hear you ask? I'm gonna tell you.

First problem, and it's a big one. There is only one person that cares about what's going on, and he's made out to be a complete dick, that guy, is Broderick. The film acts like he's being unreasonable about all these lights being shone at all hours but...he's not. He's an eye doctor, that shit's important, and if you blind your town's eye doctor 'cause you want to be seen from space, then who's the real loser here? Also, if you're constantly blasting out shit loads of light, you can damage people's sleep cycles, you can really mess with the birds and other night animals which is just fucking selfish, Personally, I don't care if you mess with other peoples sleep cycles (unless they're the few people I love in my life, obviously), but if you fuck up an animals sleep cycle, you're in the bad books kidda. I hate to say this, but I'm definitely on Brodericks side with this, don't be fucking obnoxious in the pursuit of someone elses dream.

Another problem, some of the humour just falls flat, it's either predictable or jokes don't land like, for example; the Finch's young son, Carter (Dylan Blue) is looking at an almost naked painting of Tia Hall (Kristin Chenoweth) from back when she was a model for live painting. Tia says something along the lines of "I was just so sick of dating boys" then waves her hand at Carter saying "no offence". I get that it's supposed to be a cute little joke but...it's not funny. There's another joke where the daughters from both families are doing a performance at the winter festival, a la Mean Girls, and Broderick and DeVito are just catcalling their daughters, shouting "Who's your daddy" at them. They turn around and of course the joke is the guys are their daddies. Hahahaha catcalling your daughter is hilarious. Comedy gold people, comedy gold.

Also, DeVito's character Buddy, what a stupid name by the way, is a complete dick. I really hate this kind of character in live action films, in animation it doesn't bother me as much because it's not as tied to reality, you don't see Mickey Mouse providing for a family and paying the mortgage do you? No, 'cause he's gotta teach those kids morals, so the follow your dream narrative is fine in a cartoon because it encourages kids to follow their passions and set kids up for the fall into the abyss that is adulthood. In a live action comedy, targeted mostly towards adults, this sort of behaviour doesn't fly. He decides that his family can survive off the attention the fairy lights are getting him, he gives up his job and does increasingly stupid things to spite his neighbour. It's a wonder his wife even went back to him after he pawned one of her most treasured posessions. If my boyfriend sold off one of my mum's rings, my dad's chain or hell, even got rid of little Ted, he'd be gone forever. Wouldn't have it, and Tia shouldn't have stuck around when he sold off her grandmothers vase. Maybe I'm just a bitch and won't take any shit from anyone but, that's just me, I couldn't forgive something like that, maybe she could with the spirit of Christmas in her heart and such.

Onto the good stuff now, the title is hilarious to me. Deck The Halls? Let me explain if you're not seeing what I think is so funny. There's the obvious meaning behind it, deck the halls, decorating the houses, the main characters are called the Halls, it's cute. What's cracking me up is the fact that "deck" is a word used for multiple things; wooden patio, a part of a boat, knocking someone out. Yeah, not in keeping with the Christmas spirit but in at least the North of England it means to knock someone out. So Deck the Hall's makes a pretty funny title considering all Steve wants to do is knock them out. I find it funny.

Another good thing is that it's not too full on with the message of Christmas which, y'know, it's not suble by any means, but it's nicely slid in there. It gets a little bit too tedious when Christmas films try to shove the message down your throat, when you can do that yourself at Christmas dinner. It's just a good thing.

The rest of...everything is pretty pedestrian, typical "neighbours at war" story but with a Christmas message. It's a good film though, I know I've not sung its praises or anything spectacular but that's because the film itself isn't anything spectacular. Should give it a watch though, it's on Netflix for the Christmas season which...is very short at this point, however you should still watch it, if you've not already.

Anyway, peace out, stay warm, stay hydrated, see you soon.

This is just my opinion and if you disagree then that's great, I'm open to discussion and I'm always interested to hear how you feel about this film. This is also a critique which is considered "Fair Use" under the Copyright Act 1976. If you like this film then go and support its creators by buying the DVD or Bluray.