Christmas Down Under

Im 30 minutes in, and the acting is mediocre at best. The plot is pretty dismal. And the fight about birth control and having kids while a real issue felt less than real.

I haven't turned it off yet. But I still might. I can only play so much solitaire on the phone at one time.

I though I might like this in a dark horse kind of way. The Australia angle got my attention. I understand this was a farce and a romp but the acting was so over the top, I can't even believe these people were professionals. But a few have some pretty respectable credentials. Maybe the direction. The two leads were OK. Disappointed.

Look, there is no real storyline in this movie. Its just a girfriend trying to find a guy in Australia. It plays like one really long scene. That's it. Just skip past the first 25 minutes, its totally awful and pointless set-up. But starting around minute 27, I thought the movie became an enjoyable watch because the characters were funny with their gag humor and I liked the all Australia setting/actor twist. I also turned the movie into a scavenger hunt game. Here are some suggestions to keep your interest: (1) Try to count how many times Justine Kacir slips back into her Australian accent; (2) Look up the New Zealand joke references; (3) Watch the scene background/settings for future vacation stop ideas; (4) consider how different Australian Christmas decorations/settings are from US ones; (5) See how many differences you can find between words Americans and Australians use to name something (like "thong") and (6) daydream about how fun it would be to re-create Ellie Parker's indirect flight around the world to get to Australia. Where would you go? There are others, but I don't want to spoil the movie.

What's wrong with these writers? It makes me ashamed to think these are the scripts that get made into movies. Don't waste your time. Every character was ridiculous.

The first 5 minutes hurt my ears so bad that I couldn't stand any more of it. It sounded like a 7 year old's birthday party that got out of control. Too much talking over each other, too noisy and loud. Who thought this was a good idea? Wait, I know who. Both the script writer and director both cam from dysfunctional families with 20 children where none of the brothers and sisters were taught any manners or got along. As I as picking up the remote to kill this mess, my wife said "I don't like this movie." Verdict in: Rated a '1' for the Tylenol we needed.