Christmas with the Kranks is a 2004 American comedy film directed by Joe Roth. The screenplay by Chris Columbus is based on the 2001 novel Skipping Christmas by John Grisham.
Plot
After Luther and Nora Krank see their daughter depart for a Peace Corps assignment in Peru on the Sunday following Thanksgiving, empty nest syndrome sets in. Luther calculates the couple spent $6,132 during the previous year's holiday season and, not looking forward to celebrating Christmas without their daughter, he suggests they invest the money usually spent on decorations, gifts, and entertainment and treat themselves to a ten-day Caribbean cruise instead. Skeptical at first, Nora finally agrees.
The Kranks are amazed to discover they are considered pariahs as a result of their decision. Luther's co-workers think he has become Ebenezer Scrooge, local stationer Aubie is distressed to lose the couple's order for their engraved greeting cards and Christmas Eve party invitations, the Boy Scout troop is upset when the Kranks refuse to purchase one of their Christmas trees, and the police are stunned to discover they won't be buying this year's calendar from them. Most vocal in their objections are neighbors Walt Scheel and Vic Frohmeyer, who organizes a campaign to force the Kranks to decorate their home so Hemlock Street won't lose the coveted award for best decorations. Children picket, neighbors constantly call, and Christmas carolers try to revive the Kranks' holiday spirit by singing on their lawn. Even the newspaper gets into the act by publishing a front page story complete with a photograph of the unlit Krank house. Still, Luther and Nora continue to stand their ground.
The two are in the process of packing on Christmas Eve morning when they receive a call from Blair, who announces she's at Miami International Airport, en route home with her Peruvian fiancé as a surprise for her parents. She's anxious to introduce Enrique to her family's holiday traditions, and when she asks if they're having their usual party that night, a panicked Nora says yes, much to Luther's dismay. Comic chaos ensues as the couple finds themselves trying to decorate the house and coordinate a party with only twelve hours to spare before their daughter and future son-in-law arrive.
While Nora scrambles to find food, especially Blair's favorite ham, Luther arranges to borrow the tree of a neighbor who is going away for a couple of days. He and Vic's son try to transport it across the street on Spike's Radio Flyer wagon, only to be stopped by the police, who assume they have stopped a robbery in progress. Once it is established why Luther is trying frantically to decorate his home, the neighbors come out full force to help him and Nora ready it for Blair.
With the party in full swing, Luther slips out of the house and goes across the street to the Scheel home. Bev's cancer, once in remission, has returned and, knowing this may be their last holiday together, Luther insists they take the cruise in place of him and Nora, going so far as to offer to take care of their hated cat. At first they decline, but ultimately they accept his generosity and Luther, whose holiday spirit has been renewed, realizes skipping Christmas wasn't as good an idea as he originally thought.
Production
Some exteriors were shot on location in Vancouver and Los Angeles. Interiors were filmed at Culver Studios and Downey Studios. Because of weather concerns, the original plan to film in the Chicago suburbs was nixed in favor of constructing the Hemlock Street set in the parking lot of a former Boeing factory.[2]
The soundtrack features many holiday standards, including "Jingle Bell Rock" by Brenda Lee; "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" by Billy May & His Orchestra with vocal by Alvin Stoller; "I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus" by Eddie Dunstedter; "White Christmas" by Dean Martin; "Frosty the Snowman" by Steve Van Zandt; "Blue Christmas" by Elvis Presley; and "The Christmas Song" by Ella Fitzgerald.
Cast
Critical reaction
Rotten Tomatoes ranked the film 58th in the 100 worst reviewed films of the 2000s, with a rating of 5%,[3] while Metacritic gave it a 22/100 approval rating.[4]
Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times rated the film one out of four stars, calling it "a holiday movie of stunning awfulness that gets even worse when it turns gooey at the end." He added, "The movie is not funny, ever, in any way, beginning to end. It's a colossal miscalculation."[5]
Carla Meyer of the San Francisco Chronicle observed, "Christmas With the Kranks boils down to a scene in which a canned ham rolls from a supermarket parking lot onto a busy highway. Filled with overly processed situations it tries to sell with manic energy, Kranks is canned, hammy and rolling as fast as it can . . . Grisham and Columbus' touches can be seen in the nonconformist male lead and icy slapstick, respectively. Roth's contributions are evident in the film's staging problems and overall lack of joy to the world . . . Scenes of Curtis and Aykroyd, so great together in Trading Places, inspire the bittersweet feelings that can accompany the holidays. Or more specifically, the bittersweet feelings that can accompany the sight of talented actors paying bills from last Christmas by doing a junky film."[6]
Steve Persall of the St. Petersburg Times graded the film C, calling it "an agreeably dumb addition to megaplexes" and "a TV movie wandering onto theater screens." He added, "Sometimes Joe Roth's movie is funny; often it isn't. Always, it's played with sitcom predictability by Tim Allen, who doesn't know any other way, and Jamie Lee Curtis, who used to know better."[7]
John DeVore of the New York Sun said, "The Christmas film is a genre as old as screwball or noir, and it has given us some of the finest moments in cinema . . . But for every treasured classic, there are dozens of crass train wrecks like Christmas With the Kranks, a new film that should make Scrooges of even the most die-hard Yuletide junkies . . . [It] is high-concept, low-brow piffle; it's pure, triple-X emotional pornography . . . The members of the cast should be ashamed, as all of them could have done better - and have in the past."[8]
Scott Foundas of Variety called the film "an agreeable, if snowflake-thin stocking stuffer" and added, "At its best, Christmas With the Kranks . . . makes some smart observations about the way a holiday rooted in generosity and kindness has been twisted into a consumerist nightmare of traffic snarls, checkout lines of biblical proportions and neighborly one-upsmanship."[2]
Box office
Despite negative reviews, the film was a box office success. On its opening weekend, it earned $21,570,867 on 3,393 screens, ranking #3 behind National Treasure and The Incredibles. It eventually grossed $73,780,539 in the US and $22,791,941 in foreign markets for a total worldwide box office of $96,572,480.[1]
DVD release
The Region 1 DVD was released by Sony Pictures Entertainment on November 8, 2005. Viewers have the option of watching it in either anamorphic widescreen or fullscreen formats. It has audio tracks in English and French and subtitles in English, French, Thai, and Korean. There are no bonus features.
References
External links
