Oh, baby, it is that time of year again! These Christmas reviews are some of my favourite and least favourite reviews to do, why? Well, I am of the opinion that most Christmas films are crap. Not all of them, of course, but after doing these reviews for the past two years I have almost run out of the good ones. This means sitting through them is not the most fun, but I do tend to enjoy writing about rubbish films a little more, so it balances itself out. And this year I came prepared by making up the list of what I am going to watch ahead of time, and let me tell you, there is a lot of crap coming up so buckle up. Anyway, without further ado let’s kick off the 2021 25 days of Christmas reviews with a reboot of a classic, Home Sweet Home Alone (2021). The film follows Jeff (Rob Delaney) and Pam McKenzie (Ellie Kemper) who are attempting to sell their home after Jeff loses his job. Jeff soon finds out that an old doll of his mothers is worth a small fortune, and they can use this to save their house. However, the doll has gone missing, and Jeff and Pam believe a young boy, Max Mercer (Archie Yates), stole it during an open house event. It just so happens that Max’s family have gone to Tokyo and accidentally left him behind, so when Pam and Jeff attempt to break into the home to take back the doll they are met by traps and obstacles set up by Max.
I am going to start this review by talking about the reception and reaction to this film. It has been absolutely slated by critics and audiences alike, sitting at an 18% and 13% on ‘Rotten Tomatoes’ respectively. Now, I am not here to say that the film is great because it is not. In fact, it is pretty bad. But those scores seem hugely low. General consensus seems to be that the film is a steaming pile of manure that isn’t worth a moment of your time, and I don’t think I entirely agree. Of course, it isn’t close to being as good as the original film and I feel like a lot of the hate towards the film comes as a result of the love of the first one and the comparisons that were guaranteed to come because of it being a ‘soft reboot’ of the series. But if you detach yourself from that there is something here. For a start, it changes up the traditional narrative by making the focus of the story the burglars rather than the kid stopping them from entering the house. We get a reason they are doing this and have sympathy for them, and this is an interesting change from that original film and give this film at least a narrative difference to latch to. All the actors are also bought in and giving it their all, and this makes you care about their characters more. When actors care you’re more likely to care too, and I fund myself enjoying the performances, despite them being somewhat over the top and cartoonish. But some of the performances in the original were cartoonish as well, so it captures that tone well. And speaking of tone, the film is clearly aiming for a child audience and a young child audience at that. It is super silly, and the cartoonish nature and fast pace would keep the attention of young children. And I also appreciate that the film doesn’t tone down how ‘violent’ the original few films were. This film is not afraid to beat up its characters pretty brutally and I do appreciate that.
Now, with all that being said, this film isn’t good, and I am not going to recommend it. And what is quite weird is that some of those positives that I mentioned earlier are also very much the negatives of the film. The focus on the burglars and making them sympathetic means that the film focuses so little on the actual child being home along the aspect of the narrative. This means that all the emotional beats it wants to hit with Max missing his family or the eventual reunion have almost no emotional impact at all. But possibly more heinous is the fact that when Jeff and Pam do the break-in and Max springs his violent traps, although it does a good job in keeping the violent and fun nature of that original film, you are sympathetic towards the burglars and not the kid defending his house. This means that the scene lacks in the slapstick comedy of the original because you are rooting for the victims. I think it is also important to mention that the fact the film is aimed towards small children means there are a lot of jokes that are childish, including an obligatory fart joke. But possibly the worst thing about this film is one line. Yes, just one line of dialogue that made me so annoyed I felt like during the film off as soon as I heard it. The line is, ‘Why do they keep reaming the classics? They are always worse’. Now, you could just argue that the film is being self-aware and making a joke at its own expense. But even if that is the case, if you’re going to make a joke like that you need your remake to actually be good. If it just joins the pile of terrible remakes and reboots, then all your doing is shining a light on your film’s issues. Not only does it make your films issues more obvious, but it also makes me actively want your film to fail so I can throw a line like this back n your face. I think I’ve made my point.
So, I am not going to sit here and say all the critics are wrong and this film is actually a gem of a film that has been overlooked and wrongly criticised. It is pretty bad, and I can see why a lot of people are hating it as much as they are. But at the same time, is it as bad as all that? I can see kids enjoying it and it does move along at a pace that means I never was bored. But saying that kids would enjoy it isn’t exactly screaming that the film is quality, and in fact might put you off even more. So yeah, not one to recommend, especially as the first two films are still easily accessible. One last thing I want to mention before finishing this is Aisling Bea who is in this film as Max’s mum. This isn’t a slate at her acting or anything, as I think she does a good job. But her character is British and let me tell you to know that hearing Aisling Bea speak in a British accent is really, really, weird.
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