This past Friday night I was trying to pick out a movie to go see, and since there were no releases of note my choices were limited. My sister, also wanting to go to a movie suggested that we go see Christmas with the Kranks. I know that all of the reviews were bad, I also had friends who had seen it and confirmed it's badness. Despite that, and the fact that the trailers gave away the whole film, we made the trip out to see it. All of the bad word turned out to be true.
The story follows the Krank family and their attempts to skip Christmas. You see, their daughter has joined the Peace Corps and has left for Brazil leaving the Kranks with an empty home. In an effort to fill that emptiness, Luther Krank (Tim Allen) hatches a plot to skip the holiday season and use the money they saved to go on a cruise. Of course these plans change when, on Christmas Eve of all days, their daughter calls to say that she will be coming home, that evening. This sends the Kranks and the entire neighborhood into a frenzy to get read for her arrival and cover up their plans.
All that said doesn't give anything away, you can learn all of that just by watching the trailers. All I really hoped for going in was that I be more entertained than I was when I saw Alexander, recently. I'd rather have watched that again, at least there we had a film that tried to be good, it failed, but at least it tried.
The acting from all involved in this misbegotten project is awful. Overacting is the norm here. Tim Allen struggles, but just does not generate an interesting presence, he comes of as smarmy and selfish until the broadcasted ending is arrived at. Jamie Lee Curtis gives one of the worst performances I have ever seen from her. She is constantly yelling, and freaking out, and just being generally annoying. It was almost as if the cast saw how bad this movie was going to be and just decided to see how bad they could be.
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