Illumination presents: How The Grinch Stole Christmas

Well, I've finally seen The Grinch. And I must say that it's a good children's movie, harmless at worst.

The only real contention, aside from the plot padding with Fred the Reindeer, I could think of is the interpretation of the Grinch. I notice a lot of fans love the Grinch when he's at his most nasty. A really mean villain with no Freudian Excuse of why he hates Christmas. Personally, I think a lot of that comes from the nostalgia of the 1966's animated special (along with two other animated specials that capitalizes on the Grinch's mean persona).

This interpretation of the Grinch heavily focuses on his reclusive nature rather than his wicked persona. It heavily reminds me of reports of Theodor Geisel being a recluse artist living on top of a California hill, looking down upon the Christmas decorations set up by his neighbors. Or AVGN groaning over the fact that everyone gets to play good video games for Christmas while he is stuck with the bad ones in that Christmas Special. And for the story, it actually works. Especially regarding to the Whos' acceptance of the Grinch to their Christmas feast even though it's quite clear that he stole all of their decorations and gifts.

I also liked that they added a bit of Reality Ensues with the Grinch expecting to be rejected by the Whos after he confesses to stealing all of their stuff. As great as the animated 1966 special was, it was always a bit strange of he happily sends back all of the gifts and the Whos are pretty much okay with it.

If you want something that is a perfect adaptation to the original book, stick with the 1966 animated special since there's a lot of things that I wanted The Grinch to adapt (in terms of lines and imagery) that didn't make it into the film one way or another. But if you wanted more explorations of the themes that Dr. Seuss established and not be bogged by more "adult" humor, I say give this one a watch. It's the true to the spirit of the book to say the least.

My list of random little things I had a thought about below. An overall opinion of the movie will follow soon.

-If the giant tree was the thing that finally sent Grinch over the edge to steal Christmas, why did he steal everything BUT THUH TREE??

-If Cindy couldn't think of a way to get tons of syrup up to the North Pole, how did she build a whole tree house? Isn't she supposed to be inventive and creative?

-Loved the little white birds that had feet like skis. Brilliant design.

-Loved the idea of a tree that is so gigantic, it needs to be lifted by airplane, and then decorated with 8-foot-tall ornaments and put onto the tree by a crane. Gives a very miniature-ish feel to the Whos.

-Angela Lansbury has five lines or something and then is never seen or heard from again.

-Always great hearing Kenan Thompson in anything!

-"Raw roast beast is a feast I can't stand in the least." Then why does it look like you LIKE it, like you WANT to eat it? The motivation for this Grinch doesn't quite gel with the original poem.

Edited by kyun on Nov 12th 2018 at 7:58:26 AM

Maybe he ran out of room and it would take all night to steal a hugeass Christmas tree like that one anyway.

He didn't steal the tree in the live-action version either. But I'd assume that's because it'd be too difficult to depict in live-action, and this version doesn't have that excuse.

Still haven't seen it. I was going to see it this Friday, but I ended up seeing The Nutcracker and the Four Realms instead.

I actually just saw it today.

Personally, I enjoyed it. It wasn’t amazing, and probably wouldn’t stand up to much scrutiny, but it was still rather fun.

Until he decided to steal Christmas, the Grinch didn’t actually do much beside be somewhat grouchy, and other Poke the Poodle type stuff, which makes the “You’re a Mean One Mr. Grinch” feel much less deserved. Even if you want to keep him a bit sympathetic, he should at least be a bit more of nasty curmudgeon than this.

It also kind of bugged me how a lot of the plot threads didn’t actually go anywhere. A good example is when in the middle of the movie the Grinch and Max go on this whole side quest thing to find a reindeer, and we get this whole sideplot about it, which becomes completely pointless when the reindeer doesn’t even end up staying throughout the rest of the movie!

Edited by megaeliz on Jan 18th 2019 at 1:50:28 PM

Actually, everything in that song is false when applied to the Grinch in this film. He does NOT have yellow dirty teeth, he's not as cuddly as a cactus but is ACTUALLY cuddly! He's also not downright evil either. Stealing Christmas is his one and only major massive crime.

Hell they even rendered some of Seuss' text false. The shot playing when the Narrator says "raw roast beast is a feast he couldn't stand in the least", the young Grinch is clearly WANTING to eat it. But he's outside peering in, and feels he's too different to join them.

And Seuss wrote the lyrics to the song, so it also reflects his vision of the character as well.

Since it has to stretch out what basically amounts to a thirty minute television special (since the original 66' version is basically the book with extra cartoony gags thrown in), having the Grinch be a bit more sympathetic was probably unavoidable, but there are other ways to do that then the rather lazy Freudian Excuse.

Edited by megaeliz on Jan 18th 2019 at 1:49:02 PM