“But if we always learned from our mistakes, nobody would ever spend Christmas with their family.”

Drake’s rating: One and a half decrepit Santas

Drake’s review: There’s a scene in A Merry Friggin’ Christmas in which a father and his two adult sons are panicking after hitting a decrepit Santa with their truck. The father has a friend who owns a chemical warehouse, and they briefly consider dissolving the body in acid, but that plan is swiftly discarded. They think about burying the Santa but the younger son, who had been in the army, tells the others that he’s dug foxholes and he knows it will take too long. The last idea, burning up the Santa, is unanimously approved and the father, figuring that smaller bits will burn faster, fires up his chainsaw.

Now if A Merry Friggin’ Christmas had leaned into this sort of black humor throughout, then I would likely be championing it as an unheralded cult classic. Unfortunately, there are too few scenes like this as the movie straddles an uneven line and never goes all-in on what does work, and instead spends far too much time on what doesn’t.

The basics of it are pretty simple: Boyd (Joel McHale, from Becky, which Kat reviewed and you should really see because it’s great) is estranged from his alcoholic father but ends up going to his parent’s house for Christmas. Boyd’s also desperate (almost maniacally so) for his son to continue to believe in Santa Claus. So when he realizes that the boy’s presents were left at home, he embarks on the long drive back to his own house to retrieve them. When his car breaks down, his father Virgil (Robin Williams, Club Paradise and probably a hundred other movies, but I’ve seen that one most recently so there you go) picks him up, and they’re eventually joined by the younger son Nelson (Clark Duke, Superbad, which I haven’t seen, even recently, but at least I’ve heard of it) who had been sleeping in the porta potty in the back of his father’s truck. No, I’m not going to explain that.

The trip to Boyd’s house and back lets the three men bond to a degree, and Virgil realizes that he’s been a truly awful father. Meanwhile, Boyd’s wife Luann (Lauren Graham, Bad Santa, a twisted holiday flick that I liked but didn’t love, but it was still much better than this one) gets drunk with her mother-in-law Donna (Candice Bergen, oh, c’mon, we all know who Candice Bergen is!) in the attic as they find Boyd’s old paintings of Bea Arthur. Which isn’t even as funny as it sounds. Boyd’s older sister and her husband are also at his parent’s house, solely to have a son and daughter so that more kids can be in the movie.

So on the one hand there’s a movie about a dysfunctional family forced together for the holidays, and on the other there’s the road trip movie that wants to build a father/son bond so that we can get to a reasonably happy ending. And these two movies don’t so much crash together as veer around aimlessly, bang fenders a few times, and then sputter to an embarrassing halt just in time for the credits to roll. There are a few good bits of dialogue along the way, and the aforementioned Santa scene, but that’s where the good stuff ends. The rest is simply filler, lacking any real bite since that might alienate anyone who was looking for a happy holiday flick. Which this isn’t, so that cautionary take was simply a waste of everyone’s time.

Movies that mix genres are a tough act to pull off, and while there is certainly potential in a black comedy/holiday flick, A Merry Friggin’ Christmas just flops around aimlessly between the two ideas and then runs out of breath and lies around gasping for air. Kind of like the distant cousin who spiked the egg nog to borderline flammable levels and then decided that he was the life of the party before falling into a comatose state under the Christmas tree.

Yeah. Holidays.

Intermission!

• This one was directed by Tristram Shapeero, a television veteran who directed two dozen episodes of Community.
• It was also executive produced by fellow Community alums the Russo Brothers, who went on to do a bunch of stuff for Marvel. I did see the Marvel flick they did with Robert Redford. That was pretty good.
• And of course I know that Joel McHale was in Community! But Becky was great and The Wrath of Becky (which he’s not in….um, spoiler) was fantastic so you should really see both. In order. No cheating and watching TWoB first, now.
• And who in their right minds casts Lauren Graham without giving her a monologue that she can spit out with her trademark machine gun delivery? Seriously, that was an oversight.
• This was sadly one of Robin Williams’ last movies. Bad Santa was coincidentally John Ritter’s final movie. Look, I’m just saying that if you get the chance to be in a holiday movie with Lauren Graham, maybe just say no.