Category: 2000s

I imagine it’s hard to create a Christmas classic. Somehow Jon Favreau managed to capture the right magic with the story of Buddy the elf, played by Will Ferrell, an orphan who was accidentally brought as an infant to the North Pole by Santa and thus raised by an elf father. After Buddy learns he is actually a human, he journeys to the big city to meet his father who horror of horrors resides firmly on the Naughty List. Ferrell carries most of the load as he perfectly encapsulates the fish out of water innocence of a pure soul first encountering the ‘real world’ for the first time. I could probably do fine without the love interest or the younger brother, but it’s still quite endearing. 

It’s a testament to the caliber of the actors here and their performances that a film that has as many problematic story lines as this one is still endearing. Alan Rickman cheating on his much superior wife with a predatory co-worker is the least of its issues. We have Hugh Grant as a Prime Minister hitting on a staff member whom for unknown reasons everyone calls fat. There’s Andrew Lincoln obsessively lusting after his best friend’s new wife, even at their wedding. Kris Marshall is such an aggressive creeper that he has to take his schtick across the pond. And yet I still get warm feelings from many of the other story lines and watch it almost every year, except Kris Marshall’s scenes. I fast-forward through that crap.    

Ving Rhames is the titular character, a Christian drag queen still mourning the death of his partner who finds himself drawn into the lives of single mom and drug addict Alfre Woodard and her daughter. Surprisingly to me, Rhames is incredible as Holiday, imbuing the character with much softness and emotion from his hesitation in letting someone(s) new into his life to the heartbreak of coming to terms with an imperfect situation. His relationship with the young daughter is sweet to watch. Woodard isn’t quite at her best playing a thoroughly unsympathetic character; she’s rather shrill and overwrought with no development beyond her ability to cause destruction in the lives of those who care for her. On the other hand, Mykelti Williamson has a surprising turn as Woodard’s drug-dealing boyfriend who steps in to help when she fails.

Chinese-American surgeon Michelle Krusiec is in the closet to her conventional family, even allowing them to try to match her with any number of eligible bachelors. Unbeknownst to everyone else, her mother Joan Chen harbors secrets of her own that could bring shame to their family. The film centers on Michelle’s attempts at balancing her burgeoning relationship with her strict familial expectations and her mother’s newly found situation. While obviously somewhat low budget, it remains a light hearted, cute take on romance in various forms.