I do not like holiday movies. Among the annals of our modern holiday classics is nestled the sicko torture film Home Alone. Surprisingly, this movie is easier to sit through than most holiday drivel. But let me assure you, it still has a ton of issues, namely, it takes place around Christmas, grown men are severely maimed—and the violence and injuries are presented in such a way that the audience is encouraged to laugh in glee at these disfigurements—and parents fly across the country and leave their child behind, yet nobody calls child welfare services.
We’re introduced to the McAllister family straight off, which consists of eight-year-old Kevin (Macaulay Culkin, back when he was notorious for being so adorable you’d puke from the cuteness), older brother and obnoxious bully Buzz, some other siblings and cousins you won’t care about—ditto an unnamed aunt and verbally abusive uncle—and Kevin’s parents, played by John Heard and Catherine O’Hara.
Let me take a moment here to discuss something important: I love Catherine O’Hara. Who doesn’t, really? I used to watch SCTV just for her. She’s hilarious. That she was saddled playing the most horrible mother in the history of movie moms—and yes, I’m including Faye Dunaway’s Joan Crawford in that summation, because ol’ Joan never forgot Christina existed when she was beating her with wire hangers—is probably the biggest problem I have with this flick. Seriously, how could the filmmakers do this to our beloved Catherine? Bums.
So, bit of a spoiler in that last paragraph: the McAllisters are heading to Paris for Christmas, and they completely forget Kevin exists, leaving him behind. This is only the first time during the movie that you as the viewer will be asked to open up your cranium and remove all reason, sanity, rationale, and disbelief. Other instances will be when:
But I digress. Kevin is on his own now, and immediately catches the attention of two burglars who are casing the neighborhood. Kevin must be a genius child prodigy with magnificent ESP skills, because he immediately senses these guys are up to no good, and goes home to fool said robbers into thinking there’s a party at his house, thanks to the previously mentioned cardboard cutouts that we all have hanging around our homes, don’t we? (Kevin is also an arts-and-crafts prodigy, methinks.) As a backup plan, he also befriends the neighborhood’s local scary old man/suspected murderer.
On the plane to Paris, our hero Catherine O’Hara realizes she’s left her youngest behind (see world’s worst mom above). As soon as she lands, she immediately tries to get back home. Not so easy—all the flights to Chicago are booked, because everybody knows the Windy City is the perfect place to be for Christmas, because who doesn’t enjoy a little frostbite with their holiday cheer? She manages to get on a plane to Scranton (also full of frostbite in December, but less popular for some mysterious reason) where she hitches a ride with a traveling polka band, headed by John Candy, another SCTV alum—hooray! Their scenes are hands down the best in the movie. I have no complaints here, so let’s move on.
Back at home, Kevin uses his child prodigy super-sensory hearing to learn the bad guys have figured out Kevin truly is home alone. What’s an eight-year-old to do? Call the cops? Call the local murderer, even? Heck no. These burglars are stupid enough to announce when they’ll be hitting the McAllister house, so Kevin can prepare the booby traps.
And what booby traps they turn out to be. By that, I mean this eight-year-old Mensa genius is also one of the most malicious and vicious movie villains in the history of cinema. Kevin sets up such elaborately sadistic scenarios that Hellraiser’s Pinhead is jealous he didn’t think of them. Marv (David Stern) is shot in the forehead with a BB gun, hit in the head with a crowbar, smacked in the face with a heated laundry iron, gets a nail through the foot on tar-covered stairs, steps on shards of glass Christmas ornaments barefoot, takes a hit to the face again, this time with a paint can, and falls from a height of about eight feet while climbing a rope bridge. He also gets a tarantula to the face, but really, he should’ve been relieved at that point, because tarantulas are generally fuzzy and not heated to flesh-burning temperatures.
Marv arguably has it easy. His partner, Harry (Joe Pesci), is shot in the groin with a BB gun, has his hands broiled from a heated-to-flesh-burning-temperatures doorknob while simultaneously being branded with the letter M, has the top of head cooked by a blowtorch, also gets a paint can to the face—so hard it whacks a filling out—is knocked unconscious after tripping on a wire, and falls with Marv from that rope bridge thingy. And these aren’t even all of the booby traps, just the most painful ones. You know who else enjoyed inflicting pain on humans? Literally every serial killer you’ve ever heard of. No wonder Kevin gets chummy with the murderer across the street: it takes one to know one!
For exactly one minute of the movie, Marv and Harry seem to get the upper hand, but Kevin’s new psycho killer friend saves the day and rescues his protégé. The burglars are off to jail, and Kevin’s mom makes it home for Christmas Day (as does the rest of the family, who simply took a later flight and had to put up with exactly zero polka bands). All’s well that ends well, right?
Not so fast: this movie has a sequel.
Because it’s totally believable a mother would forget about her youngest child a second time, right?
I can only wonder what this family’s—and those two burglars’—psychiatric bills must look like.
___________
This review and so much more appears in Longo Looks at . . . CHRISTMAS, available now on Amazon!
We’re introduced to the McAllister family straight off, which consists of eight-year-old Kevin (Macaulay Culkin, back when he was notorious for being so adorable you’d puke from the cuteness), older brother and obnoxious bully Buzz, some other siblings and cousins you won’t care about—ditto an unnamed aunt and verbally abusive uncle—and Kevin’s parents, played by John Heard and Catherine O’Hara.
Let me take a moment here to discuss something important: I love Catherine O’Hara. Who doesn’t, really? I used to watch SCTV just for her. She’s hilarious. That she was saddled playing the most horrible mother in the history of movie moms—and yes, I’m including Faye Dunaway’s Joan Crawford in that summation, because ol’ Joan never forgot Christina existed when she was beating her with wire hangers—is probably the biggest problem I have with this flick. Seriously, how could the filmmakers do this to our beloved Catherine? Bums.
So, bit of a spoiler in that last paragraph: the McAllisters are heading to Paris for Christmas, and they completely forget Kevin exists, leaving him behind. This is only the first time during the movie that you as the viewer will be asked to open up your cranium and remove all reason, sanity, rationale, and disbelief. Other instances will be when:
- an eight-year-old manages to feed himself regularly, do laundry, find Dad’s aftershave (but not his condoms), and generally run a 5,000-square-foot home singlehandedly with no issues.
- an eight-year-old outwits a pair of career criminals using cardboard cutouts, toy soldiers, an electric charcoal starter, and a tarantula.
- an eight-year-old is clever enough to use an electric charcoal starter and a blowtorch against the bad guys, yet still does not burn down the house, even though the living room curtains are inches away from said blowtorch.
- you realize this family owns a 5,000-square-foot home, plans to be away for two weeks, and yet doesn’t own a security system.
But I digress. Kevin is on his own now, and immediately catches the attention of two burglars who are casing the neighborhood. Kevin must be a genius child prodigy with magnificent ESP skills, because he immediately senses these guys are up to no good, and goes home to fool said robbers into thinking there’s a party at his house, thanks to the previously mentioned cardboard cutouts that we all have hanging around our homes, don’t we? (Kevin is also an arts-and-crafts prodigy, methinks.) As a backup plan, he also befriends the neighborhood’s local scary old man/suspected murderer.
On the plane to Paris, our hero Catherine O’Hara realizes she’s left her youngest behind (see world’s worst mom above). As soon as she lands, she immediately tries to get back home. Not so easy—all the flights to Chicago are booked, because everybody knows the Windy City is the perfect place to be for Christmas, because who doesn’t enjoy a little frostbite with their holiday cheer? She manages to get on a plane to Scranton (also full of frostbite in December, but less popular for some mysterious reason) where she hitches a ride with a traveling polka band, headed by John Candy, another SCTV alum—hooray! Their scenes are hands down the best in the movie. I have no complaints here, so let’s move on.
Back at home, Kevin uses his child prodigy super-sensory hearing to learn the bad guys have figured out Kevin truly is home alone. What’s an eight-year-old to do? Call the cops? Call the local murderer, even? Heck no. These burglars are stupid enough to announce when they’ll be hitting the McAllister house, so Kevin can prepare the booby traps.
And what booby traps they turn out to be. By that, I mean this eight-year-old Mensa genius is also one of the most malicious and vicious movie villains in the history of cinema. Kevin sets up such elaborately sadistic scenarios that Hellraiser’s Pinhead is jealous he didn’t think of them. Marv (David Stern) is shot in the forehead with a BB gun, hit in the head with a crowbar, smacked in the face with a heated laundry iron, gets a nail through the foot on tar-covered stairs, steps on shards of glass Christmas ornaments barefoot, takes a hit to the face again, this time with a paint can, and falls from a height of about eight feet while climbing a rope bridge. He also gets a tarantula to the face, but really, he should’ve been relieved at that point, because tarantulas are generally fuzzy and not heated to flesh-burning temperatures.
Marv arguably has it easy. His partner, Harry (Joe Pesci), is shot in the groin with a BB gun, has his hands broiled from a heated-to-flesh-burning-temperatures doorknob while simultaneously being branded with the letter M, has the top of head cooked by a blowtorch, also gets a paint can to the face—so hard it whacks a filling out—is knocked unconscious after tripping on a wire, and falls with Marv from that rope bridge thingy. And these aren’t even all of the booby traps, just the most painful ones. You know who else enjoyed inflicting pain on humans? Literally every serial killer you’ve ever heard of. No wonder Kevin gets chummy with the murderer across the street: it takes one to know one!
For exactly one minute of the movie, Marv and Harry seem to get the upper hand, but Kevin’s new psycho killer friend saves the day and rescues his protégé. The burglars are off to jail, and Kevin’s mom makes it home for Christmas Day (as does the rest of the family, who simply took a later flight and had to put up with exactly zero polka bands). All’s well that ends well, right?
Not so fast: this movie has a sequel.
Because it’s totally believable a mother would forget about her youngest child a second time, right?
I can only wonder what this family’s—and those two burglars’—psychiatric bills must look like.
___________
This review and so much more appears in Longo Looks at . . . CHRISTMAS, available now on Amazon!
In case you missed it the forty-seven other places I bragged about it, that orange flag there says #1 New Release. Finally, my mockery of religion has paid off!
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