I am a fan of Home Alone, it’s a fun movie, you have a good cast, it’s a decent enough story and I like a bit of slapstick comedy. You also have a combination of John Hughes and Chris Columbus.
One thing about Hughes is, as a writer, he understands characters, he makes you either fall in love with or hate the protagonists in his films.
I’ve always liked Kevin McAllister, he was a nice kid, fed up with his family, but you are with him all the way through the original movie. OK, so Macaulay Culkin wasn’t the best actor in the world, but you did believe in him. There are moments where you actually feel afraid for him.
Kevin’s mum, played by the brilliant Catherine O’Hara, again, you sympathise with, she’s a mother who’s doing all she can to get home to her little boy. She goes above and beyond to do whatever she can to get home.
The Wet Bandits were good too, coz they were actually bad guys, if they ever got the upper hand on Kevin, they would have cut his toes off! Which was a deleted scene from the original.
The original movie is, I’m going use the term, classic. It’s well made, it’s funny and it’s just a fun movie to watch, even now after all this time.
Home Alone 2 was OK and everything after that has got worse, which brings me to the new Home Sweet Alone Home. Here’s my review.
As you may know, I’m trying to watch 1,000 movies this year, I have seen some great ones and some stinkers. One that stands out as a stinker was Santa Claus Conquers The Martians, which was pretty bloody awful. This new Home Alone makes it look like Citizen Kane! I think it’s easily the worst movie I have seen this year.
The story is, *sigh*, a kid is left at home, wishing his family away because he wants peace and quiet. Some neighbours are having financial troubles and have a rare doll that will solve their problems. The neighbours end up thinking that the kid stole the doll and plan to steal it back.
So instead of Kevin, Max in this new version, being in any real danger, it’s just a nice couple trying to get a doll back. No threat, no danger, no tension.
Max is played by Archie Yates, who played Yorki in Jojo Rabbit, where he was excellent. In this, he’s a chubby kid with glasses. That’s it, all the character development done and dusted.
You then have his mum, played by Aisling Bea. You may not have heard of her, but she’s been on a lot of British TV and she is very funny and has the most gorgeous Irish accent. I genuinely love her, she’s usually great. The first thing I hated about this movie was, they made her speak in English! OK, I get she can’t do American, but if you’re going to get her to be English, just let her keep her Irish accent!
The rest of the cast is usually funny, Rob Delaney, Ellie Kemper, Kenan Thompson, Chris Parnell, to name a few. In this new Home Alone, there is nothing funny about them at all. I actually felt embarrassed by all players. God knows why any of them said yes to this. I know there’s a paycheck, but I just can’t see any of them being this desperate!
They even dig up Devin Ratray, who played Kevin’s older brother Buzz in the original. He’s now a security guard/cop, who refers back to Kevin and him being left home alone. I say ‘dug him up’, coz I had no idea he was still acting. I’ve been through his resume and there’s nothing on there outstanding. He needs to find an agent who gives a shit about him.
The movie ends, coz I’m going to spoil it, coz you should never, ever watch it, everyone learns a lesson about family and home is where the heart is. It’s like they couldn’t be bothered to write something interesting, just a good lesson for all concerned. It was pointless from start to finish.
There is a moment in the movie where people are watching a remake of the black and white movie that Kevin watched, Angel With Filthy Souls I think it was called, the one where the guy says:
“I’m gonna give you to the count of 10, to get your ugly, yella, no-good keister off my property.”
The remake is horrible and looks crap. Someone makes a joke about how remakes are never as good as the original. This was done as a little ‘joke to the audience’, but I found it was more of a ‘you’re a moron for watching this crap’. It wasn’t a fourth wall joke, it was an insult since the entire movie is just so bad!
There is some of the original music in the movie, which annoyed me even more since it’s trying to compare itself to the original.
This was one of the worst movies I’ve seen in a while, there is nothing to redeem this movie, it’s not funny, it’s badly written, the director could have been a kindergartener who won a competition to direct a movie from the back of a box of cereal.
As you may know, sometimes I love a bad movie, coz it’s so bad it’s good. This is not one of those movies, this is so bad it’s bad, terrible, horrible, painful to watch even! No joy could be found in watching this movie. I’m sure the devil has made a note of this movie and will use it for torture in hell.
Home Sweet Home Alone get 0 stars. There is nothing in this movie I could find to give it a good score. I hate it when people saying things like ‘it’s the worst movie I’ve ever seen’, but this, for me, is close. It’s a waste of everyone’s time, money and efforts. Do not watch this movie, ever. If you want a laugh, watch the original again.
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