Four Christmases

• Directed by Seth Gordon
• November 26, 2008

A couple, having avoided their families for years on Christmas, find themselves having to visit each of their divorced parents on Christmas once their secret is exposed.

I really expected Four Christmases to be as bad as Fred Claus. That movie was horrid. This movie was made during a writers strike so changing the script to fix “issues” was not an option. Maybe that was a good thing as it probably stopped any stupid ideas from making it onto celluloid.

This is a funny movie about a couple that has been essentially hiding their lives from their families until one Christmas while trying to sneak off to a vacation in Fiji for the holiday they are fogbound and caught on camera at the airport forcing themselves to go and be with their relatives. Anybody who has told a white lie to get out of something can identify with that and anybody that has been found out will definitely feel for Brad (Vince Vaughn) and Kate (Reese Witherspoon).

Brad and Kate are products of divorce and avoid their families like the plague. They have gone so far as to pretend to work overseas on charity during Christmas. This film plays up family oddities to comic affect. As an outsider you can certainly understand why you Brad and Kate would want to hide from the relatives.

In roles as the parents we have Jon Voight, Sissy Spacek, Mary Steenburgen, and Robert Duvall all playing parents in this movie. They are quality actors that bring the goods but I always wonder how you get actors in movies like this. This is certainly not an Oscar caliber film nor is it meant to be. It is just silly fun.

The script is funny and much of the humor comes from the family encounters as well as when the secrets this couple has hid from each other get revealed. There is nothing too shocking or serious here. The funniest for me is when Kate’s family who assumed she had a lesbian relationship on high school shows Brad pictures of her girlfriend. The humor comes when Kate who did not do anything with her friend realizes after so many years what was actually going on.

Vaughn and Witherspoon help boost the material which as stated before could not be changed. There on screen chemistry as well as the chemistry they have with the actors playing their family members works. They work well together.

While I won’t call this a Christmas classic, Four Christmases is an entertaining Christmas film. You will get some laughs and maybe the occasional feel and be entertained. If you come across this don’t be afraid to watch it!