8 Women (2002)

François Ozon directs Catherine Deneuve, Isabelle Huppert and Fanny Ardent in this musical murder mystery where a family of femme fatales find themselves snowed in with a dead body on Christmas Day.

A class act. The song and dance interludes are not particularly memorable but the costumes and tantrums are. Pretty much each and every beauty, whatever their vintage, goes through a sexual transformation, as if the life-size Cluedo set is a cocoon for French cinema’s hardiest butterflies.

8

Serendipity (2001)

Peter Chelsom directs John Cusack, Kate Beckinsale and Jeremy Piven in this Christmas set romcom where a pair of starcrossed lovers meet cute and decide to let fate decide if they will ever meet cute again.

Pretty but very contrived. Cusack and Beckinsale suffer an endless series of near misses but you are not ever entirely convinced as to why they part company in the first place? OK… We wouldn’t have a movie otherwise…but… But! Cusack is a little too cool for all this while Kate, Piven and Molly Shannon treat it like the Hollywood big break it was. They sparkle just as much as a gorgeously decorated festive Manhattan.

6

Home Alone (1990)

Chris Columbus directs Macaulay Culkin, Joe Pesci and Daniel Stern in this family comedy where a precocious 8 year old has to protect his home from burglars when he misses the plane to Paris.

An iconic staple, still one of the most profitable sleeper hits ever. I remember it staying in cinema screens well past the winter, long into the spring. The acting is broad with Culkin proving a natural alongside pitch perfect work from his highly stung adult co-stars. The slapstick violence is wish fulfilment for little kids of all ages. Beyond the inventive concussions and blow torches, the film suffers from a mean streak. The rich McCallister family is awful in general and unwarrantedly nasty to our baby faced protagonist. You’d be quite happy if he were left to his own devices for far longer than a few days of popcorn and pizza. Or if he just left a few of his lethal booby traps up to deal with his cunty kin when they bolt through the door just in time for the credits. John Williams out Danny Elfmans Danny Elfman with his jaunty yet sinister wintery score.

6

National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation (1989)

Jeremiah S. Chechik directs Chevy Chase, Beverly D’Angelo and Juliette Lewis in this comedy where the Griswold family’s December goes to utter shit.

I have a massive affection for the Griswolds (Sparky, Rusty, heterosexuality confirming at an early age Beverly D’Angelo, the daughter) due to Vacation & European Vacation. They were family favourites in our house in the Eighties. Despite making money in the States, this went straight to video over here. NLCV isn’t quite as chaotic or expansive as it predecessors but has enough slapstick and Chase’s trademark mugging to pass muster. It actually is the Christmas setting that papers over the gaping flaws, lack of raunch and weaker bits. With its animated credit sequence and overly decorated house, the movie feels like a Christmas classic even if the joke in the cracker is a little tired and gravy stained.

5

Tim Burton’s The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993)

Henry Selick directs Danny Elfman, Chris Sarandon and Catherine O’Hara in this stop motion animation classic where Jack Skellington decides he wants to branch out into running a new holiday.

One of the greatest animations ever, this thrills and seduces norms and kooks alike. The relentlessly upbeat score dashes through the snow and the slime. Every scene is filled with delightful grotesques. Its breathless jam packed brevity means we never linger too long and outstay our welcome. Tim Burton’s iconic designs are still one of the most darkest yet profitable corners of the Disney Store but director Henry Selick did the graft. Some shots are so complex and cinematic you marvel at the Herculean effort put in to manipulating every element in the shot one painstaking frame at a time. Jack Skellington is a hero for all of us who want to be a little different, not just accept the hand we’ve been dealt. But I personally love the bug filled sack of swing Oogie Boogie. Ends on one of the sweetest moments in cinema history.

10

White Christmas (1954)

Michael Curtiz directs Bing Crosby, Danny Kaye and Rosemary Clooney in this musical romantic comedy where two pairs of music acts fall for each other over their Christmas break from performing.

Not quite as magical as Holiday Inn but more winningly focussed on Christmas. The technicolor VistaVision dance numbers are often mind boggling thanks to Vera-Ellen’s poise and skill, Edith Head’s vibrant costuming. Crosby and Kaye are a little creaky to modern eyes but the gals absorb all the focus with their effervescent star turns. The title number bookends the film… the first blast taking place in a bleak bombed out WWII holding point, the final bombastic revisit during a spectacular stage show where all the romantic misunderstandings are neatly straightened out to leave you with a mile wide smile and glow in your heart.

8

The Man Who Invented Christmas (2017)

Bharat Nalluri directs Dan Stevens, Morfydd Clark and Jonathan Pryce in this biographical fantasy where Charles Dickens, in desperate need of a hit, self publishes A Christmas Carol while being pursued by his imagined creations and his own past.

A nice solid bit of London Victoriana, a period as visually synonymous with Christmas as Post-War Small Town America. I’ve read a big biography on Dickens in the distant past and this rings pretty true with the man as presented there despite being a broad comic book fanfic account of his mid-career slump. The expansive cast is noticeably better than the material and there are few surprises. It hits it marks with enthusiasm and confidence even if very little else is achieved.

6

Check out my wife Natalie’s Point Horror blog https://cornsyrup.co.uk

We also do a podcast together called The Worst Movies We Own. It is available on Spotify or here https://letterboxd.com/bobbycarroll/list/the-worst-movies-we-own-podcast-ranking-and/

Joseph Sargent directs Robert Shaw, Walter Matthau and Martin Balsam in this action thriller where armed men take a New York Subway train hostage and demand a cool million within a tight one hour deadline.

An immaculate entertainment. A salty sense of time and place… AND THAT TIME AND PLACE IS 70s NYC… the coolest, sleaziest, corduroy brownest time and place. A jazzy alarm bell of a score by David Shire, it just may be the greatest movie theme ever. A frumpy but wry turn by Walter Matthau, more Captain Philips meets Columbo than John McClane. A dictatorial slice of coiled villainy from Robert Shaw as the intractable villain with a plan. The crammed ensemble is just as poppin’. Even down to the twentieth or thirtieth billed there are gems of character actor work. Jerry Stiller gets crumpled laughs with every couldn’t-give-a-shit utterance that comes out of his mouth. The eventual kinetics pelt along with a real world logic and desperation grips like a vice. Will they make the cash drop deadline? Will the villains getaway? How can the hostages survive their fate? And the movie remains gleefully cynical and fleet footed right up until the final shot. A savoury double bill tasting partner with the first Die Hard. “What Do the Fucking Passengers Expect for a Lousy 35 Cents – To Live Forever?”

10

Check out my wife Natalie’s Point Horror blog https://cornsyrup.co.uk

We also do a podcast together called The Worst Movies We Own. It is available on Spotify or here https://letterboxd.com/bobbycarroll/list/the-worst-movies-we-own-podcast-ranking-and/

Carles Torras directs Celso Bugallo, Mario Casas and Déborah François in this thriller where a recently paralysed man becomes murderously jealous of his able bodied girlfriend.

A rote spool of nasty, where unpleasant people get their comeuppance unbelievably. At least it makes the effort to establish the title character as an unredeemable shit long before he is consigned to his wheelchair. A small mercy in terms of representation but I’m struggling to think of any other positives here apart from a technical competency.

3

Check out my wife Natalie’s Point Horror blog https://cornsyrup.co.uk

We also do a podcast together called The Worst Movies We Own. It is available on Spotify or here https://letterboxd.com/bobbycarroll/list/the-worst-movies-we-own-podcast-ranking-and/

Tom Tykwer directs Ben Whishaw, Rachel Hurd-Wood and Dustin Hoffman in this period adaptation of the modern classic where a murderer with a supernatural sense of smell kills beauties and tries to capture their scent.

One of the finest novels ever written, Patrick Süskind’s Perfume is an erotic journey into callous brutality, irony and sensual mastery in 18th Century Europe. This sturdy realisation of the dark magical realism does a fantastic job of visualising Jean-Baptiste Grenouille’s hyperactive nostrils. We share a world of filth, decay, beauty and delicacy with Ben Whishaw’s near-mute parasitic outsider. The stronger first half of the film has a camp, bigger than life performance by Dustin Hoffman as an ageing perfumer. He tags out and Alan Rickman comes in as a father desperate to protect his precious virginal daughter from the killer who stalks his region’s alleyways and boudoirs. Run Lola Run’s Tykwer switches to epic sweep mode here and loses the audience slightly after the superior intimacy of breathing the same smells as Whishaw for so long. The grand finale though is pretty writhingly unique and bravely lensed.

7

Check out my wife Natalie’s Point Horror blog https://cornsyrup.co.uk

We also do a podcast together called The Worst Movies We Own. It is available on Spotify or here https://letterboxd.com/bobbycarroll/list/the-worst-movies-we-own-podcast-ranking-and/

John Ford directs John Wayne, Jeffery Hunter and Vera Miles in this classic Western where a Civil War veteran and mixed race boy hunt the Native Americans who killed their family and took captive the young girls.

Pretty much every shot in this is a Technicolor marvel. Ford’s location work in Monument Valley is epic and unparalleled. Strange to think that pioneer colour cinematographer Winton C Hoch won three Academy Awards, lensed this sumptuous masterpiece, and then ended his career working on Time Tunnel & The Banana Splits for TV? It just doesn’t tally. Wayne manages to turn his simple man of action and vengeance into an enigma. We identify with him as he is the only one taking control, the loudest voice, the only undomesticated beast left in the wilderness. We don’t know if he is on a rescue mission or blinded by hate. His hatred towards the ‘Indian’ race is unfettered and palpable. There is no equivocating. He is racist. “Hero” as he is the only man left and driven enough to get the job done. Yet the film always frames such an attitude as wrong. His deeds posit him tipping over into becoming the villain, much like Red River we foresee a conclusion where the younger man might have to gun the old rabid dog down. Maybe the reason he hates the movie Comanches so much is they like him are a dying, outdated breed. Ethan Edwards and Scar are savage, nomadic and go against the grain of post-war humanity. Their strengths and outlook are not welcome at the wedding dance or the reservation. History is leaving their biases and violence behind, the pioneers no longer need a gunslingin’ alpha driven by righteous anger now the West has been won. The Searchers closes the doors on the old values as they serve their purpose after one last half decade spanning crusade. It is a ride of thrilling adventure and danger, far more sophisticated in its dramatic presentation of prejudice than modern eyes give it credit for. The point isn’t that racism gets the job done, it is that such an attitude has had its final day and is no longer welcome in a civilised society. That iconic shot of a door closing on Edwards is not a lament for his generation but punctuation.

10

Check out my wife Natalie’s Point Horror blog https://cornsyrup.co.uk

We also do a podcast together called The Worst Movies We Own. It is available on Spotify or here https://letterboxd.com/bobbycarroll/list/the-worst-movies-we-own-podcast-ranking-and/

David Michôd directs Brad Pitt, Anthony Michael Hall and Topher Grace in this war satire loosely based on the exploits of General Stanley McChrystal who took over the occupation of Afghanistan and tried to win the war of hearts and minds that literally nobody else was invested in.

An alright film – not as funny, or zany, or affecting as it needs to be but well made and navigating some harsh truths of modern geopolitics. I find it hilarious that something so solid has an arbitrarily low score on Letterboxd. The main reasoning seems to be the kids don’t like Brad Pitt with grey hair but I suspect the true symptom is that a glimpsed Barack Obama is painted in an unflattering light. The woke generation don’t like seeing their idolised icon behaving how a politician must and world leader has no choice but to. Slippery. I reckon this representation is closer to the truth and have no issue with that. But yeah… this is a “rubbish movie” as a broad Pitt plays his age and has an amusing old man run. Bless his goofy heart, he commits to it. Catch-2010.

5

Check out my wife Natalie’s Point Horror blog https://cornsyrup.co.uk

We also do a podcast together called The Worst Movies We Own. It is available on Spotify or here https://letterboxd.com/bobbycarroll/list/the-worst-movies-we-own-podcast-ranking-and/

Richard Stanley directs Nicolas Cage, Madeleine Arthur and Joely Richardson in this sci-fi horror where a middle-class family who have relocated to the wilderness are terrorised by the puce contents of a meteorite.

Richard Stanley (director of Dust Devil, and nothing since due to the vagaries of Hollywood) teams up with horror comeback Cage to do Lovecraft. This could have been a bin fire and I’d still be in. The movie itself is a creepy uneasy treat. Not fully palatable for mainstream audiences. The performances are variable, not helped by Stanley’s eagerness to shoot a lot of his dialogue in face-on close-ups. Cage starts out amusingly as a pretty regular unhip Dad but soon warps into a mix of Jack from The Shining and a Donald Trump impersonation as his idyllic life goes off the rails. It is an unpredictable, unrestrained jolt of acting… in keeping with the surreal mania of the plot. Either you are going to relish Cage obliviously collecting mutant tomatoes or you are going to switch off. I’m a tomato kinda guy personally. Madeline Arthur holds her own as the witchy daughter, though her personal disintegration isn’t given enough screen time to fully convince. She fares better than the older son who you forget even lives at the farmhouse until he suddenly reappears next the family dog who you have been caring about. Stanley is a rare unique voice in genre cinema and for the first half he seems muted and aiming for a subtle atmosphere of paranoia. Once the alien bacteria begins altering everyone’s DNA and perception the brakes come right off. The shocks in the final act are genuinely affecting and relentless. A visual treat for fans of both The Thing and 2001: A Space Odyssey. Only one shoddy CGI character reveals the budgetary limitations and Stanley is smart enough to cut around and only let us glimpse that monstrosity. Most “modern” directors would hold on such a weak FX as it cost a sizeable proportion of the budget. Stanley knows a rush of overwhelming chaos and nasty we can’t stop to pick apart is far more powerful. A beautifully ugly cult item.

7

Check out my wife Natalie’s Point Horror blog https://cornsyrup.co.uk

We also do a podcast together called The Worst Movies We Own. It is available on Spotify or here https://letterboxd.com/bobbycarroll/list/the-worst-movies-we-own-podcast-ranking-and/

David Swift directs Hayley Mills, Hayley Mills and Maureen O’Hara in this Disney romantic comedy where accidentally reunited twin sisters swap lives in the hope of rekindling their divorced single parents love for each other.

Bright and conservative, god only knows how many times I watched this as a kid? The creaky values and aspects are what make it now, in a cheesy kinda way. You could hardly say Mills’ dual role is particularly easy on modern eyes and ears. Or that true A-Lister O’Hara is expected to do much more than walk down stairways in lovely dresses. There is some light, pleasant slapstick that keeps the engine running even when the plot is having its eighth fag break.

5

Check out my wife Natalie’s Point Horror blog https://cornsyrup.co.uk

We also do a podcast together called The Worst Movies We Own. It is available on Spotify or here https://letterboxd.com/bobbycarroll/list/the-worst-movies-we-own-podcast-ranking-and/

Gina Prince-Bythewood directs Charlize Theron, KiKi Layne and Matthias Schoenaerts in this comic book action movie where immortals act as “a rescue team, not assassins” throughout history.

The key problem with any protagonist who cannot be killed is watching them survive a conventional action sequence contains zero peril. It is why Batman will always be more exciting than Superman. Why The Terminator movies must also contain a Connor. The Old Guard does eventually start to hint that its invulnerable death squad do have limitations to their regenerative powers but this weakness is never exploited. The spectacle here is pretty rote and for some reason accompanied by the breathy whispery pop tunes that became a cliche in trailers a decade ago. You understand every stylistic and narrative decision but it is hard to be excited by them. This is Highlander meets The Avengers but the most plain, unflavoured variation of that potent conceptual mash-up. Theron is shockingly lacklustre, the plot plodding and noncommittal. Positives? There is a decent fight / training level / initiation on a cargo plane and two of our lower billed former crusaders have heated moments of romance. These are the straws I clutched at under my duvet on a grey afternoon. As with most Netflix mega budgeted originals I found it hard not open a side window on my screen and scroll the internet after a while. I had no such issue of aimless distraction with the cheap dated film below, watched with the same AV set-up in bed.

4

Check out my wife Natalie’s Point Horror blog https://cornsyrup.co.uk

We also do a podcast together called The Worst Movies We Own. It is available on Spotify or here https://letterboxd.com/bobbycarroll/list/the-worst-movies-we-own-podcast-ranking-and/

Ubaldo Ragona and Sidney Salkow direct Vincent Price, Franca Bettoia and Emma Danieli in this indie horror where a lone survivor of a vampire zombie apocalypse holes up in his home.

The first attempt to adapt Richard Matheson’s I Am Legend. Bleak and hammy at the same time, though Price (the Nicolas Cage of his day) almost ensures these qualities. Also filmed in Rome’s EUR region (featuring distinctive concrete futurist architecture) this could easily be the immediate sequel to the quiet cataclysm we see in Antonioni’s L’Eclisse. That film ends with an eerie depopulation of the streets, here Price, when not barricading himself away from clumsy reekers, desperately scours the same abandoned suburbs. While often cheap and ineffective, a lot of the imagery predates future zombie classics uncannily.

6

Check out my wife Natalie’s Point Horror blog https://cornsyrup.co.uk

We also do a podcast together called The Worst Movies We Own. It is available on Spotify or here https://letterboxd.com/bobbycarroll/list/the-worst-movies-we-own-podcast-ranking-and/