Four Christmases Review
by Steve Rhodes (steve DOT rhodes AT internetreviews DOT com)November 26th, 2008
FOUR CHRISTMASES
A film review by Steve Rhodes
Copyright 2008 Steve Rhodes
RATING (0 TO ****): ** 1/2
FOUR CHRISTMASES is one of the first films for the coming Christmas season. It's a comedy that uses Christmas more as a staging device than as a subject. Although there are holiday decorations everywhere, the mood isn't particularly festive and none of the feelings of the season come through even in a dark and ironic way. It just happens to be Christmas, so we have an opportunity to visit four dysfunctional families in a single day.
The film is not a memorable Christmas present for viewers. But it's no lump of coal either. It's passable entertainment with just enough good laughs to make it worthwhile.
What it does have is a sterling cast. While the two leads, Vince Vaughn and Reese Witherspoon, as longtime lovers Brad and Kate, demonstrate good chemistry together and consistently hit their comedic marks, the same cannot be said of the supporting cast. The supporting cast is certainly talented, as Robert Duvall and Sissy Spacek play Brad's divorced parents while Jon Voight and Mary Steenburgen plays Kate's divorced parents. Still, this star power is largely wasted with none of the actors, save the two leads, breathing much life into their roles. And the writers give all of the good lines to the leads, especially to Vaughn, whose mile-a-minute delivery of some very funny stuff is the best part of the picture.
When we first meet Vaughn and Witherspoon, they are a couple of bickering strangers at a bar. As the two of them, under assumed names, trade pickup lines and insults, Vaughn gets the upper hand in their series of exchanges when he tells Witherspoon, "If I wanted an asexual pen pal, you'd be on the top of my list."
Soon after their staged fight, we see Brad and Kate back at home in their luxury apartment atop one of the San Francisco hills. They aren't married but are extremely happy together, as they take large and awkward pains in continually reminding each other.
When the Christmas season rolls around, Brad and Kate always head off to a third world country to help the impoverished. Well, that's the rationale they give their parents as the reason they won't be coming home for Christmas. Brad and Kate, however, are way too hedonistic to spend their precious time on good causes or with bad families. The stories they give their families are always lies. (Several characters point out that the word "families" contains the word "lies.") Brad and Kate make a point of spending their holidays in different luxurious and exotic venues. Their only problem is the fear that their vacations may end up being repetitive.
After fog grounds all the planes and Brad and Kate's families accidentally see them on TV stuck at the airport, Brad and Kate are forced against their will to endure all four families in one single, awful day. Of course, they survive it all and learn a thing or two about themselves in the process. The comedy can be fairly slapstick at times, but it works in fits and spurts. What falls miserably flat is the whole last act, as the story tries to switch to heart-warming drama. This whole last part feels forced and tacked on.
But it falls to Vaughn's Brad to make it worth the price of admission, as he delivers various hilarious thoughts on life. Among other things, Brad tells us that his childhood was like "The Shawshank Redemption" and that the beauty of having children is that "they're like little walking tax shelters."
Still, I expected more of FOUR CHRISTMASES since it was directed by Seth Gordon, whose THE KING OF KONG: A FISTFUL OF QUARTERS was last year's best documentary. Steve Wiebe, the star of THE KING OF KONG, has an unmemorable cameo in FOUR CHRISTMASES.
FOUR CHRISTMASES runs a fast 1:22. It is rated PG-13 for "some sexual humor and language" and would be acceptable for kids around 8 and up.
My son Jeffrey, age 19, giving it ** 1/2, said that it was sort of fun. He said that there were no amazing laughs but there were some good ones. He didn't have strong feelings about the film other than that the last act was weak and that he enjoyed seeing Steve Wiebe again. Jeffrey's girlfriend Yasmin, also 19, gave it *** and would have given it more, she said, if the last part have been better. She found the film much like MEET THE PARENTS, a movie that she loves. She liked how crazy Brad and Kate's families were.
The film opens nationwide in the United States on Wednesday, November 26, 2008. In the Silicon Valley, it will be showing at the AMC theaters, the Century theaters and the Camera Cinemas.
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