The kind of dumb shit people watch around winter (if, for some reason, you just watch whatever movie is on TV rather than streaming whatever takes your fancy - and I don't mean on Netflix or Amazon or anything that feels too legal. Seriously, why can't the internet just be full of cake recipes, pirated movies, porn, and imaginative viruses like it used to be? It feels too clean now, it's kind of like what happened to Vegas (that reminds me, I should do 'Casino' at some point - 'Goodfellas' first, though)).
It's not particularly funny, but it is just enough, and everyone will get it. I'm assuming your part of a big family and you're all watching TV and opening presents at the same time, and maybe eating a turkey or decorating an evergreen and then attempting to fall asleep despite being far too full and trying not to think about all the people who'd really like to have had one of those pies rather than lentils or nothing. You just ate it for the sake of it though, you had already had five - Jesus Christ. Or maybe you spent Christmas alone, or didn't realise it was happening. Maybe you don't celebrate, or maybe you're just going to a house party. That's all fine too, and as a bonus is less wasteful and stressful than the big family thing. But if you are doing the big family thing, there'll be a TV somewhere, and it'll have child friendly movies and probably 'Doctor Who' and then some specials of sitcoms that you vaguely know of. This is the sort of movie for this crowd, as everyone from a toddler to a grandparent will get the jokes, and the story is simple enough to almost entirely disregard. Idiots would also enjoy it, or, uh... people who havn't ever seen a film? Drunks?
There's a somewhat creepy (aren't they all? Really though, this one looks like the Kinder Bars kid) kid who lives in a mansion with piles of other children and two parents. Turns out it's not the 1700's though, as the whole family fucks off on a plane for a holiday and leaves creepy blonde guy at home. He's fairly self sufficient though, so it's not the end of the world. Oh wait I guess it is, as the parents majorly freak out over it and decide to cut their trip short and go back to him (waste of money, and it's his own fault, but OK). I can't remember weather they tried calling him to see if he'd be alright without them for a bit, or calling a neighbor to check in on him, but I'll assume that neither of those worked out. Then two ridiculously inept thieves show up and fall into a series of violent booby (heh) traps that the kid sets up. I spent most of the time irritated at them for not simply killing the guy or watching the house and robbing it when he went out for food. The rest of the time was spent cringing at every bad joke and slapstick accident, some of which were pretty damn violent. This was one my first viewing; I was seven.
The kid has some vague personalty, but is basically just your generic rich kid. The parents do nothing other than shout, whine, and then cry. The robbers go back and forth from anger to pain. The script is terrible, the plot plans well enough to reference upcoming pranks (hey, remember he had a tarantula? Bad guys hate tarantulas!) but other than that follows a ridiculously tedious track. The effects are basic, the camerawork run of the mill. I forget what the music was like but the 80s had just happened so it was probably terrible.
That's about it really, but I can't stress enough how disturbing our little aryan protagonist's actions are. He's not above petty crime, and he gleefully inflicts serious injuries on two morons throughout. I particularly like this article, which poses the possibility of him being a young Jigsaw.
I didn't realise how lowly I was going to rate this movie when I started writing this, but during the process just thinking about this film made me annoyed. It's for the kind of people who enjoy pulling the legs off bugs. I didn't find it funny, I was just reminded how light-heartedly violent our society is.
Home Alone: 13.2