Christmas in Wonderland

I read a lot of the reviews on this movie and to be honest it does have some really bad acting. Unrealistic situations. and predictable lines.

I liked seeing the film filmed in Canada. What I didn't like was their portrayal of Canadians and idiots. Tho the chief was a bumbling he did act well.But it still portrayed them as not being very smart. It was a family movie and is clean with no bad language.

I liked seeing the attractions at the mall shown in the movie. To bad that some of the actors in the movie couldn't bring the level of the movie up from a b movie. Family movie. Good to watch with younger kids. not really an Adult movie.

I had not heard about the 2006 movie "Christmas In Wonderland" prior to sitting down and watching it here in 2024, as part of my December month of binging Christmas movies. And yeah, I thought that this was an actual Christmas movie.

But I have to say that I found the storyline to be somewhat like "Home Alone" in a way, except it took place in a mall. Just because the movie's narrative was set during the Christmas time, doesn't mean that it was a Christmas movie. So I was a bit disappointed with the fact that this wasn't an actual Christmas movie. That being said, then don't get me wrong, because it wasn't as if "Christmas In Wonderland" was a bad movie, not at all. It just wasn't what I was expecting. Writers Wanda Birdsong Shope, James Orr and Jim Cruickshank put together a fair enough script and storyline.

The acting performances in the movie were good, and there were some familiar faces on the cast list, with the likes of Patrick Swayze, Tim Curry, Chris Kattan and Cameron Bright.

Watchable, for sure, just don't expect this to be a traditional sappy Christmas movie. I am sure that if you enjoyed the "Home Alone" movie, then you might actually also enjoy this movie.

My rating of director James Orr's 2006 movie "Christmas In Wonderland" lands on a five out of ten stars.

I was warned by the reviewers on IMDb not to see this film, but I did decide to give it a chance for two reasons; Patrick Swayze and Tim Curry. My thoughts on watching Christmas in Wonderland were that while there were some good moments, the film could've been much better. It is a long way from being the best movie ever and from being a Christmas classic like Scrooge(1951), Miracle on 34th Street, Home Alones 1 and 2 and It's a Wonderful Life, but personally I do not think it's the worst ever either, Disaster Movie, Home Alone 4, NeverEnding Story 3, Cat in the Hat and Superbabies:Baby Geniuses 2 were much worse.

So what were the good things? Well the soundtrack was one. The incidental music was not bad, but I liked very much the song choices. Christmas in Wonderland is certainly memorable, same with Not So Zen. But my favourite is Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas, the timeless tear jerker, immortalised by Judy Garland in the musical Meet Me in St Louis. It was nice to see the West Edmonton Mall too. Also Mary's conversation with Santa twenty minutes into the movie was the closest to heartwarming Christmas in Wonderland got, likewise with the moralising between Wayne and the imaginary Santa in the bar. While I do agree that the writing was not very good at all on the most part, there are one or moments of inspired physical comedy. No I am not talking about the crooks chasing the kids on the escalator, I am chiefly talking about Carmen Electra's character Ginger after falling into the water having a hard time with the seal. That was funny, shame the whole film, while starting off ever so promisingly, didn't have the same kind of momentum.

Before mentioning the cons, I am going to talk about the performances and start with the good ones first. Most of the acting was terrible, and while the more decent performances were anything but outstanding, there were one or two bright spots in the cast, particularly the two lead kids. Matthew Knight is quite appealing as Brian, and his sister Mary is played by the adorable Schlagel twins Amy and Zoe. And Tim Curry, the wonderful and underrated actor he is, is actually quite entertaining as the memory-challenged McLoosh. Critics were divided on Curry's performance, others praised him as one of the few bright spots of the movie, others complained of his performance being full of sheer pantomimic excess. I would be inclined to agree with the former, while he does overact a bit, and his Scottish accent leaves much to be desired(though the accent is infinitely better than Jon Voight's German accent in Superbabies:Baby Geniuses 2), he at least makes some effort to make the most of the questionably meagre material he was given, and his facial expressions were priceless.

However, the other performers weren't that much better. Whereas in general I enjoyed Tim Curry's performance, I was disappointed with Swayze. Perhaps this movie would have been forgotten, if it weren't for the fact that it was one of Swayze's last performances before he sadly died. He wasn't terrible, but the script gave him very little to do so no matter how hard he tried it was a bit of a wasted effort. Cameron Bright as Danny gives a very lifeless and monotonic performance; there were times when I wanted to give him a kick up the backside. Chris Kattan and Preston Lacy step into their roles with enthusiasm but like Swayze they weren't given that much to do. That leaves Carmen Electra. While I wanted to see this movie for Swayze and Curry, I was hesitant as well because of Electra. Sorry, I can't stand her, I just don't think she can act, and a lot of the characters she plays are more of the same. She was marginally better than she was in Disaster Movie and Meet the Spartans, both movies in which she was truly terrible, but that is not saying much.

Other problems I had with Christmas in Wonderland was that the script, no matter how physical-comedy engineered it was, was clunky and devoid of humour, and gave the actors little to work with- a lot of the "funny" lines just weren't funny. The repeated gag about McLoosh forgetting everyone's names was funny the first couple of times, but it got tiresome, an oft-danger with repeated gags. Then there's the formulaic and utterly predictable plot and the fact, it looks like in terms of camera work etc. direct to video quality. The direction from James Orr ranged from sloppy to non-existent, the love story between Danny and Shane was underdeveloped and out-of-the blue and the CGI I agree was rather fake and amateurish. All in all, has some good moments, heavy emphasis on the some, but it is mediocre. Showed good promise, but didn't deliver in most aspects. 4.5/10 Bethany Cox

Usual daft extreme ratings here. As with most films, it is not a 1/10 or 2/10 film, nor is it a 9 or 10/10 film.

It is as someone else here described, reasonable Christmas fodder. I did not find it any worse than Home Alone 2.

It is essentially a children's film and they should enjoy it, it had a few laughs, was interesting, easy to follow, a couple of good characters, played well by Curry and Electra. It was also good to get such a detailed showing of the Mall.

For adults it is far too much of a giant cliché though. The two boys, as a lot of these films do, have the worst hair cuts imaginable, or lack of cut.The young girl, could be the young girl in about 100 films and as in any Christmas film, it is Christmas Eve and they still have not put the tree up.

There are a couple of really peculiar moments which seemed to serve no purpose whatsoever. When Patrick Swayze is buying the underwear for his wife, the whole scene and in particular the lady serving him was completely nonsensical and the whole scene should have been removed. You also had the oldest boy falling for a girl who came from the same city, for the same reasons, to the same new city and had the same unusual name as his other girlfriend for reasons unknown and which went nowhere.

All in all though, it is a decent watch. A little better than the 4.9 rating and will entertain you more than many daytime Christmas films.

Most of all, it was wonderful to see the marvellous Patrick Swayze in one of his last roles, as endearing as ever.

BEWARE OF BOGUS REVIEWS. SOME REVIEWERS HAVE ONLY REVIEW ONE FILM. THAT TELLS ME THEY WERE INVOLVED WITH THE PRODUCTION. I HAVE REVIEWED OVER 200 Christmas MOVIES. I HAVE NO AGENDA. I AM FARE ABOUT THESE FILMS.

IN THIS FILM Three kids and their Dad move from L.A to Edmonton. When they go shopping at West Edmonton Mall they find counterfeit cash. They inadvertently help catch the crooks, and later make a discovery about Santa.

The film is safe for small children but they will even be bored. The cast of familiar faces do their best but the material just isn't there.

The screenplay had a nice gem of an idea but it needed a little more work. Had the screenplay been better the film could of been great.