Deck the Halls

It's A Wonderful Life spoiled us. It raised the bar for Christmas movies to such a remote height that they haven't been able to, or have even tried to reach since. Deck The Halls, like so many other movies of good cheer, slots comfortably into the latter - refusing point blank to deliver something, anything, other than a tasteless, laugh-starved re-thread. But this is a Christmas movie, and I'm supposed to take off the critic's hat for an hour and a half and be full of yuletide joys - it's the season of goodwill to all men and crap movies after all, right? Wrong. Deck The Halls is a bad cover version of National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation and that wasn't exactly a bastion of laughs, was it? Set in a sleepy town in Massachusetts, Steve Finch (Broderick) is known locally as 'the Christmas guy'; that is, until the competitive Buddy Hall (DeVito) moves into the neighbourhood. Buddy wants his house to be seen from outer space and goes about putting together the most grandiose Christmas lights display the town has ever seen. As the two neighbours go to war, their families get caught up in the fight, putting Christmas is in danger for all concerned. Utterly forgettable, there is nothing in Deck The Halls to be cheerful about: the plot is wafer thin, the laughs fall flat on their faces and the acting is below-par. After a year out of movies, Broderick returns to put the smell of last year's stinker The Producers behind him, but he needn't have bothered; his cutsey performances peaked at Ferris Bueller and are really starting to grate now. He's in good company, as DeVito is woefully miscast and Kristin Davis, along with having the most annoying head in Hollywood, is an actress of very limited talent.