Roger Ebert’s Brutal Takedown of a Christmas Film Favourite
Roger Ebert didn’t mince words when reviewing 'All I Want for Christmas', slamming it as manipulative and hollow. Find out why this festive flick copped such a scathing critique.
When it comes to festive films, most punters are happy to let a few things slide. After all, the silly season brings a flood of Christmas flicks, many of which are only dusted off for a few weeks each year. But for Roger Ebert, a bloke who took his job as a critic seriously, every film had to stand on its own two feet—no matter how much tinsel was involved. While classics like Frank Capra’s It’s a Wonderful Life or the much-debated Die Hard have earned their stripes, the rest of the Christmas catalogue is a mixed bag at best. Sure, films like Elf, The Polar Express, Scrooged, Home Alone, Jingle All the Way, and Bad Santa have their fans, but you’d be hard-pressed to call them masterpieces.
Still, Ebert was always up for giving any film a fair go. That said, there was one Christmas flick he reckoned he’d never sit through again. In his infamous 0.5-star review, he quipped,
“All I want for Christmas is to never see All I Want for Christmas again.”
He didn’t hold back, calling it
“a calculating holiday fable that is phony to its very bones; artificial, contrived, illogical, manipulative, and stupid. It’s one of those movies that insults your intelligence by assuming you have no memory, no common sense, and no knowledge of how people behave when they are not in the grip of an idiotic screenplay.”
Star Power Can’t Save a Dud
Despite a cast that included the legendary Lauren Bacall and Leslie Nielsen donning the Santa suit, Robert Lieberman’s romantic comedy didn’t win over critics or audiences. Ebert’s harsh words were echoed by many, and the film quickly faded into obscurity. Rather than coming off as a grinch, Ebert seemed more like someone who just couldn’t stand a lazy script.
The plot follows two siblings who, hoping to see their divorced parents back together, hatch a plan that involves kidnapping their mum’s fiancé and locking him in an ice cream truck bound for New Jersey. If you’re guessing it all wraps up with a neat, happy ending, you’re not wrong. Ebert summed up his disbelief, saying,
“There was not a moment of the movie I could believe. Not a motivation I thought was plausible, not a plot development that wasn’t imposed on us by the requirements of the plot (example: The driver of the ice cream truck has bad hearing, to explain why he can’t hear the bore banging on the window behind his head). Movies like this give ‘cute’ a bad name.”
Formulaic Festive Fare
For Ebert, All I Want for Christmas was the definition of formulaic. It ticked every box for a by-the-numbers holiday film, with none of the charm or wit that might have saved it. The story, he reckoned, could have been scribbled out by any uninspired screenwriter half-asleep. In the end, the film got nothing from Ebert but a lump of coal, and a place on his list of films best left unwatched.