Love the Coopers Synopsis: The intertwined stories of four generations of Coopers unfold right before the annual family reunion on Christmas Eve. Can they survive the most beautiful time of the year? Charlotte and Sam have decided to divorce after forty years of marriage, but they agree to have one last family Christmas before telling their grown children of their separation. Their children, Hank (Ed Helms) and Eleanor (Olivia Wilde), have their own issues. Hank is going through a divorce, complete with a moody teenager and a younger son who just wants everyone to be happy again. Eleanor has a strained relationship with her mother and decides to ask a soon-to-be-deployed soldier to Christmas dinner in the guise of being her boyfriend. Charlotte’s sister Emma has a shoplifting problem and their father Buddy (Alan Arkin) invites a waitress (Amanda Seyfried) from a nearby diner to dinner. Love the Coopers is very reminiscent of The Family Stone and countless other holiday family dramedies that came before it. There are some hits and plenty of misses, but I found Love the Coopers extremely enjoyable. I would never have imagined Diane Keaton and John Goodman married with children, but they have such lovely chemistry that made it easy to believe they had been together for forty years. I also really enjoyed the scenes between Wilde and Jake Lacy, who played Joe, the soldier at the airport. They seemed to be complete opposites, personality-wise, but I thought they had good chemistry too, and I could have watched an entire rom-com centered around those two characters. Anthony Mackie shows up as a withdrawn cop tasked with taking Emma (Marisa Tomei) to the station after she’s caught stealing at the mall, and she decides to play head shrink on the car ride. Alex Borstein plays Angie, Hank’s ex-wife, who, for some reason, is invited to Christmas dinner even though she and Hank cannot stay in the same room for more than a few minutes without fighting. Buddy and Ruby (Seyfried) have a touching relationship somewhat intertwined with Hank and Hank, and Angie’s teenage son is going through growing pains of his own with a crush who works at the mall. Whew. Yes, a lot is going on, but Love the Coopers never felt muddled to me. Watching Charlotte and Sam’s marriage disintegrate over a trip not taken is heartbreaking, but I got the impression that their arguments gave their marriage hope of survival. They were willing to fight to reach each other and find mutual understanding. Diane Keaton is amazing, as usual, as was John Goodman. They’re the glue that holds the entire family and movie together, and they do it wonderfully. This movie is not as dramatic as some in the same genre, but it’s absolutely worth a watch. It has many laughs, attributed to June Squibb, who plays Sam’s eccentric aunt, and an earnest ending that leaves you feeling quite warm and full of the Christmas spirit. Watched: 12/23/2020Notable Song: To Love Somebody by Nina Simone
‘Christmas Cupid’ (2010) Review
Christmas Cupid Synopsis: Los Angeles publicist is forced to reconsider her life choices as she gets visited by ghosts of her ex-boyfriends on the eve of Christmas. Sloan Spencer (Christina Milan) is an ambitious PR executive looking for a promotion to VP. She’s dating the son of the man who owns the company, which surely helps her case, but she’s also in charge of planning a movie premiere for her reckless, party-girl client, Caitlin Quinn (Ashley Benson). When Caitlin chokes to death on an olive, Sloan’s movie premiere turns into a premiere/memorial. The job becomes even more complicated when Caitlin visits Sloan from beyond the grave, warning her that three spirits will show her what her life will become if she doesn’t change her ways. Christmas Cupid is a very (very, very) loose adaptation of A Christmas Carol. Clearly, Sloan is meant to be Scrooge, with Benson’s Caitlin as Marley. Instead of the ghosts of Christmas past, present, and future, Sloan is haunted by former exes. That’s where Christmas Cupid’s similarities to the novel end. Milan’s Sloane is nowhere near the “Scrooge” level needed to make her transformation significant. Is she unlikable? Yes, of course. But the movie seems to think that if she yells at a lot of people and forgets to help out a friend, then she’s comparable to an iconic miser who needed a swift kick in the butt from three ghosts to avoid a doomed afterlife. The thing that makes Scrooge’s transformation so believable and moving is that each spirit shows his memories or circumstances that touch his heart, even if he has trouble showing it. You see glimpses of a soul he had long since buried by the time he’s forced to face his own mortality; he’s ready to change and make amends. Sloan, however, remains selfish and unaffected, even when faced with moments where she hurts someone else. It’s not until she sees herself unconscious and alone in a hospital that she’s ready to think about someone other than herself… although she’s still acting selfishly. She doesn’t want to die alone, so she’s willing to treat people better. Everything that came before that seemed to be dismissed. Chad Michael Murray pops up several times as Patrick, Sloan’s college boyfriend, now a doctor. They were in love once, but Sloan waited for Patrick to go to class one day, emptying their apartment and dumping him in a note. In the present day, she goes out on a date with Patrick and then ignores him completely after her corporate boyfriend shows up to propose to her. How this guy decides to take her back is beyond me. Christmas Cupid (who is Cupid, by the way?) is a cookie-cutter Christmas romance with a weak script and mediocre acting. The enjoyable parts were between Caitlin and Sloan, especially once Caitlin stopped being a vodka-drinking bubblehead and showed actual depth. Christmas Cupid is a cheesy movie with very few redeeming qualities. There is no doubt a gazillion other Christmas romances like this one, so I recommend watching those before giving this one a try. Watched: 12/23/2020Notable Song: Silent Night (Dance Version) by Big Swede Feat. Tali
‘White Christmas’ (1954) Review
White Christmas Synopsis: A successful song-and-dance team become romantically involved with a sister act and team up to save the failing Vermont inn of their former commanding general. After the end of WWII, Bob Wallace and Phil Davis left the army to go on to become a famous song and dance team. While on tour, they are invited to see the sister act of a buddy they knew in the army. It’s there they meet sisters Judy and Betty Haynes. Judy and Phil get along quite nicely, but Betty and Bob initially feel a bit prickly toward one another. Thinking that perhaps Betty would be the perfect woman for Bob to settle down with, Phil manipulates events in order to follow Betty and Judy to Vermont. There, they face their former army general, who is now running the inn where Betty and Judy are meant to perform. The inn is not doing so well, and it looks like their former general could lose everything if things don’t turn around soon. Desperate to help, Bob, Phil, Judy, and Betty decide to put on a show at the inn. I know White Christmas is beloved by many, but this was my first time watching it. I have always loved Bing Crosby’s crooning rendition of Irving Berlin’s classic song, so I thought it was time to see what White Christmas was all about. For the most part, I did enjoy it. The song and dance sequences were entertaining and beautifully choreographed. The plot was a bit fantastical, but this is a Christmas movie, so I was okay with that. Bing Crosby and Danny Kaye matched perfectly, bringing their unique comedic talent to the film. Rosemary Clooney and Vera-Ellen were also well cast as sisters, and Clooney, in particular, was just luminescent on screen. It truly did feel like the movie was filmed like a Broadway show – had it ever been one!? – which added a bit of charm as well. There were a few moments where I felt the film dragged a bit, and Betty’s misunderstanding of Bob’s intention with the show at the inn came across as more than a little contrived. But that’s my frustration with using simple communication issues to create conflict and derail the blossoming romance. This movie was released in 1954, so perhaps that trope hadn’t been beaten to death yet, but I found it a little annoying. All in all, I can see why White Christmas is loved by so many. Watching during the holiday is fun, especially for Crosby and Kaye’s chemistry. It may not be one I’ll add to my yearly rotation, but I’m glad I finally watched it! Watched: 12./24/2020Notable Song: White Christmas by Bing Crosby, et al.