TheRetroCritic

Not content with painting his face green in The Mask and wearing nothing but green as The Riddler in Batman Forever , Jim Carrey decided to cover himself in green fur for Ron Howard's live-action version of Dr Seuss' How The Grinch Stole Christmas . This decision did pay off in that Carrey turned out to be the perfect choice to play the moody Grinch and, whether you like the movie or not, it's hard to deny the rubber-faced actor's energy makes his portrayal of the classic character a lot of fun from start to finish. Who else could have pulled off such a cartoonish role so convincingly? He even aces the old "You're A Mean One, Mr Grinch" tune in one of the movie's best and most memorable sequences. The make-up effects on Carrey as well as on all the actors playing the Whos of Who-ville are impressive and spot-on, bringing Dr Seuss' unique visual style to a live-action setting beautifully. Unfortunately, while the film boasts tons of Christma

In-between directing more arty/trendy flicks, Terry Zwigoff tried his hand at a somewhat more commercial effort with Bad Santa , a Christmas movie with a difference. The main difference being that our "bad Santa" is a shady, foul-mouthed, boozing thief who pisses his pants. Billy Bob Thornton and Tony Cox's Christmas tradition in this movie is posing as a mall Santa and Elf then robbing the whole place after the busiest shopping day of the year. Unfortunately, Willie (Thornton) is struggling to keep both his alcoholism and his sex addiction under control so he soon becomes a liability in grave danger of messing up the whole plan. Along the way, Willie meets Sue (Lauren Graham), a girl with a Santa fetish and they begin a relationship of sorts. He also meets a clingy overweight young boy amusingly called Thurman Merman, played by an appropriately wide-eyed Brett Kelly, who, for whatever reason, believes Willie to be the real Santa Claus. And although the kid annoys

If anyone was going to save Christmas, it had to be Ernest P. Worrell. Those of you unfamiliar with Jim Varney's somewhat cult creation may be missing out on some fun times, though Ernest Goes To Africa was pretty brutal... Yeah, I watched that. Ernest Saves Christmas , luckily, is one of the good ones. Not only because Varney once again delivers his own brand of rubber-faced, fast-talkin', cartoonish madness but also because Douglas Seale makes one loveable Santa and adds a lot of heart to an otherwise purely slapsticky farce. The film sees Santa search for a worthy successor and seeing as Ernest, who kindly drives Santa around in a cab, is all about that Christmas spirit, there's no better candidate to help Santa achieve his goal. Except maybe the elves who actually do have their own subplot in this movie, as do the reindeers, believe it or not. Actually, come to think of it, this movie has more subplots than it does have a plot as Noelle Parker becomes Ernest&#

Based on true events, Catch Me If You Can would have made a compelling film regardless of who directed it. A compelling documentary, even. But with Steven Spielberg behind the camera, the film was a sure-fire hit and was a thrilling, fast-paced rollercoaster ride of creative conmanism. Set in the 1960's, the film follows teenager Frank Abagnale Jr. (Leonardo Di Caprio) who learns that not only is his father (Christopher Walken) ruined but his parents are getting a divorce. Looking to find a way to fix that somehow, financially at least, Frank sets out to assume various identities and con banks with the help of fake cheques. He becomes co-pilot for an airline, a doctor and a lawyer among other things. Along the way, he is pursued by Tom Hanks' FBI agent Carl Hanratty whom he manages to trick over and over, always leaving him one step behind. It's a relentless cat and mouse game right up until the movie's final shot and although the film takes time-outs here and the

Two years after Disney tackled the tale of Rapunzel with Tangled , we now get Frozen , a slightly more Christmassy outing based on The Snow Queen. Another one word title, again in the past tense? Is it the same movie? Happily, it's not really, though there are obvious similarities. For one thing, we're back worrying about princesses and their problems involving unpredictable magical powers. This time, we follow two sisters, one of which, Anna, has the power to control snow, ice and just about anything Wintery and cold. This isn't a big deal until she accidentally hurts her little sister Elsa. After that, their (crappy) parents erase Elsa's memory with the help of a bunch of rock trolls and decide to keep both kids locked-up in the castle for ages. I have soooooo many problems with this whole plot so far I don't even know where to start but I'll just keep going so you can understand what doesn't really work about this movie and then I'll talk abo

I guess I had to review a Christmas movie at some point... You might be surprised to hear this but I actually have nothing against the first two Home Alone movies: they're charming, harmless, simple little Christmassy flicks and overall fun kids' movies. I loved them back in the day and I still find them somewhat enjoyable, albeit in a mostly nostalgic, soppy way. This sequel is often accused of being a retread of the first film and, frankly, it is but it does enough things differently that it remains completely watchable and doesn't feel too heavy-handed. Macaulay Culkin's Kevin is unsurprisingly once again left to his own devices after taking the wrong plane following a misunderstanding at the airport. He is not left "home alone" this time as much as he his left... alone. He arrives in New York while his family enjoys a disappointingly rainy Christmas in Miami and, instead of freaking out like most kids would in this situation, he decides to start sp

One year before Die Hard , a little film called Lethal Weapon came out and gave us a solid mix of 80's cop action and Christmas spirit. The film spawned several sequels, of course, and became one of the action franchises to follow. But how does the very first film hold up? Probably the darkest film in the franchise, Lethal Weapon focuses more on Riggs' (Mel Gibson) depression and Murtaugh's (Danny Glover) family life than the actual crime plot at hand, which almost feels like a subplot at times. The villains, Gary Busey's Joshua, a tough ex-army guy turned ruthless killer, and Mitch Ryan's General do pop up now and then, offering the odd action beat but all in all, this first film is more of a character piece about the slow building of an unlikely friendship. A lot of emphasis is put on Riggs' suicidal state following the death of his wife as we see him get dangerously close to killing himself and almost jeopardising various cases. Luckily, he's

I honestly wasn't sure what to expect from this movie before watching it. Was it a comedy? Was it a tear-jerker? From Satoshi Kon, the director of Millenium Actress and Perfect Blue , Tokyo Godfathers tells the story of three homeless people who find a baby abandoned on a pile of trash in the street and try to find the baby's parents. It's a simple plot, a simple concept and this leaves a lot of room for subtle character development and mini threads within this overarching storyline. Our main characters are Miyuki, a rebellious young runaway, Gin, an older grumpy, bearded guy and Hana, a gay transvestite who dreams of being a mother. Well, Hana's dream comes true early on when the homeless trio find the lost child and the film, from then on, explores the connections between people, their pasts and their futures as life offers them surprising coincidences. These characters are instantly loveable and are the heart and soul of this movie. You really care about th

It's so hard to find good Christmas movies these days, let alone animated ones. Could it be that The Nightmare Before Christmas was the last word on that? Well, from the looks of this latest Dreamworks outing, it seems that there's still hope for holiday movies yet! Rise Of The Guardians , while far from perfect (I'll get to that), still boasts enough creativity and popcorn entertainment to make it a fair attempt at something good and festive. The plot sees Jack Frost (Chris Pine) being taken in by the likes of Santa (an unrecognisable Alec Baldwin), The Easter Bunny (Hugh Jackman), The Sandman and The Tooth Fairy (Isla Fisher) to join them as a "Guardian" (basically a Moon-appointed superhero of sorts). Their goal usually being to keep kids safe and their imaginations intact, this time they're having to face off against Pitch Black (a fun Jude Law and a damn good sci-fi B movie) whose plan it is to fill everyone's heads with nightmares and make fear

Christmas movies don't come any tougher than this. Bruce Willis is officer John McClane, an NYPD cop heading for the intimidating Nakatomi building where his wife (played by Bonnie Bedelia) works to try and patch things up marriage-wise. All goes according to plan until a group of bad guys led by Alan Rickman's cocky mastermind Hans Gruber waltz in and take over the skyscraper. McClane soon becomes the hostages' only hope as he tries to foil the big-time robbers' plans from within. What follows is an exciting and nail-biting one-man stealth sabotage mission complete with explosions, shoot-outs, punches and broken glass. It's weird watching the original Die Hard after the likes of Live Free Or Die Hard because the first film really is in a different league, a different genre even. The first film wasn't about John McClane being this superman who can outrun planes and stop by Kevin Smith's house for shits and giggles: it's actually much grittier

What can I say about Edward Scissorhands ? Here's a movie I've probably seen every year since its release: like The Nightmare Before Christmas and Batman Returns , it's pretty much become a Christmas tradition. Already a fan of Tim Burton's back catalogue, this is the film which sealed the deal: Burton had my childhood by the balls and he would never let go without a fight. Since, I grew up and although some of the director's films I've grown to simply like (or feel relatively indifferent towards) rather than blindly worship, Edward Scissorhands is one of those which still feels genuinely special. I mean, modern fairytales of the sort are made pretty much every year these days and, with certain exceptions ( Pan's Labyrinth , Where The Wild Things Are ), actually good ones are incredibly rare. For every Edward Scissorhands there's 10 Gooby s. But what makes Burton's film work particularly well? The marriage of gothic Frankenstein -style B mov