Movie of the Week: Dr. Seuss' How the Grinch Stole Christmas

   

 

    Movie of the Week (12/1/13-12/7/13): Well, December is finally here and the Christmas season is upon us and I'm sure most of you reading this already have your Christmas trees up. But, you best keep an eye on your trees along with all of your decorations unless you want some green thing to take them away. That's right, lets kick off Christmas this year with a movie adapted from the classic children's book. This is one of my favorite Christmas movies to watch this time of year because it brings a smile to my face and makes me laugh. This is Dr. Seuss' How the Grinch Stole Christmas.
    This film is quite simple to follow, it doesn't have any special plot points to it until the very end and it was adapted well. It is about a fantasy land inside a snowflake that houses Whos who love the Christmas season, some might say too much. But, nevertheless they make an interesting story about one of them who hates the season of Christmas and is set on stopping it from coming by stealing all of their decorations and gifts. That person is called The Grinch.
    That Grinch character is played by non other than Jim Carrey, it's almost hard to tell that that's him under all that makeup, but it is. Jim Carrey does such a great job in this film that you can't tell it's him because of how he changes his voice and once he does that he literally is The Grinch.  He gives us such a funny performance that I laughed out loud several times throughout the movie. Without Carrey in this role I can't imagine who else could had done it and it certainly wouldn't have been the good movie it is without him. The film has a decent supporting cast with Taylor Momsen as Cindy Lou Who, Jeffery Tambor as Mayor Augustus Maywho, Christine Baranski as Martha May Whovier, Molly Shannon as Betty Lou Who, and Clint Howard as Whobris. The supporting cast here is decent not great, but The Grinch runs the show in this film, even though they give us funny performances overall.
    Now, there are two things that really make this movie stand out much further than others from when it came out and even today. Those two things are makeup and set design. The makeup on all of the characters is absolutely phenomenal. Every actor does not look like themselves as they are covered in special makeup to look like Whos. The Grinch's make and costume took hours to put on, put it was worth it as it won the Oscar for Makeup. The sets were also beautifully crafted as they helped bring to life a new place of oddly shaped houses, landscape, cars, and many other items that brought Whoville to the screen. Another great aspect of the film that got nominated for an Oscar.
    We also have very good costume designs in this film as very creative minds give each character distinguished clothing, also nominated for an Oscar. The films director, Ron Howard, also did a very good job as he gave us a very colorful and family friendly comedy, with some crude humor every now and then, that has a heartwarming premise by the film's end. Even though it's not his best work, it is one to remember for the holidays. From start to finish you will be amazed at how the film looks, how the beautiful sets look, how well crafted the makeup is, and how perfect the character costumes are. Not to mention a lot of laughs and the catchy score and great theme song.
3/4 Stars