fantasy

The Omega Code (review)

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Maybe you’ve heard of The Omega Code. This is the ‘Christian thriller’ that shocked Hollywood last year by breaking into the box office top 10, if only momentarily, playing on only a handful screens across the Bible Belt. Why Hollywood was shocked is a bit of a mystery: The independently produced The Omega Code is illogical, anti-intellectual, tedious, and absurd, but no more so than any given Adam Sandler movie. Why should religious folks be any more discriminating than the vast secular majority? A real shock would be if, say, The Insider was such a blockbuster that Mattel cashed in with Jeffrey Wigand inaction figures.

Scrooged (review)

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In fact, Dickens might have written something like Scrooged, an 80s, greed-isn’t-good update of the Dickens classic. The wittiest satire of television since Network, Scrooged gives us Frank Cross (Bill Murray: cradle, rushmore), the ‘youngest president in the history of television,’ the maniacal — and megalomanaical — head of the IBC TV network.

The Muppet Christmas Carol (review)

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I still mourn for Kermit — and for Jim Henson — though. The lamentable Bob Cratchit seems the ideal character for the creature who sang the melancholy and winsome “It’s Not Easy Being Green.” The Muppet Christmas Carol never achieves the delicate pathos it might have if Jim Henson had still been there for his froggy alter ego.

Blackadder’s Christmas Carol (review)

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Okay, so it’s not a movie. But Blackadder’s Christmas Carol is my favorite variation on the beloved Charles Dickens story of one man’s dramatic change of heart. Remember, though, dear reader, to take into account that I am a heartless bitch — anyone with an ounce of sentiment will be thoroughly appalled by this entirely mean-spirited black comedy.

The Santa Clause and Jack Frost (review)

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Little did I know when I reviewed Jingle All the Way that it is part of a trend in 90s holiday movies in which inattentive, workaholic Boomer dads go all out in attempts to win back the affections of their young, ignored sons. But while Jingle’s Arnold has to resort to a girly endeavor like shopping in the effort to appease his spawn, The Santa Clause’s Tim Allen and Jack Frost’s Michael Keaton have a much cooler alternative: magic. Allen deals in white magic; Keaton’s, unfortunately, is of the darker variety.

A Christmas Carol (Patrick Stewart) and A Christmas Carol (aka Scrooge) (Alistair Sim) (review)

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I’ve had the pleasure of seeing Patrick Stewart do his one-man reading/performance of A Christmas Carol several times. Nothing beats the impact of live theater, and so for years now Stewart has personified Ebenezer Scrooge for me. I was delighted to learn that Stewart would be playing Scrooge in a full-blown production of Charles Dickens’s classic novel — playing all this month on the cable network TNT — and fully expected that it would become a favorite Christmas movie of mine. And it has.

Toy Story 2 (review)

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Funnier and more touching and meaningful than its predecessor, Toy Story 2 is the rare sequel that improves upon its progenitor — and, considering how wondrous Toy Story was, that’s saying something. Toy Story — as funny and fun as it was — was also bursting with joy, with the delight the filmmakers obviously took in bringing a roomful of toys to life. Toy Story realized that secret childhood fantasy we all had, that our toys had lives of their own, that they played with one another when we weren’t around.

It’s a Wonderful Life (review)

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Remember that ‘alternate ending’ of It’s a Wonderful Life that Saturday Night Live came up with years ago? George never finds out what happened to that $8,000 that nearly ruined him, and the film ends on a happy note when the townspeople pitch in to raise the money. SNL’s ending was a little darker: Someone discovers that Potter has George’s money, and so we’re treated to the spectacle of Dana Carvey as Jimmy Stewart leading a lynch mob: ‘Well, let’s get ‘im!’ Carvey’s George cries. That’s more the ending I’d like to see.