Film
How the Grinch Stole Christmas
- Director
- Ron Howard
- Certificate
- PG
- Running Time
- 104 mins
If you feel queasy every time a big, expensive Hollywood movie presumes to lecture you on the over-commercialisation of Christmas, you may want to give Ron Howard’s turn-of-the-millennium adaptation of the Dr. Seuss yarn a wide berth. Smaller and less cynical cinemagoers could find more to enjoy in this primary coloured funfest, whose rhyming narration is deliciously performed by Hannibal Lecter himself, Anthony Hopkins.
The Grinch lives in splendid grumblesome isolation high up in the mountains outside Whoville, where he wallows in filth with his comedy dog and terrifies any Whos straying off the beaten track. Turns out he’s been this way since childhood, when he was teased at school on account of being green and whiskery at the age of eight. The festive convergence of his humiliation with rejection from the girl he loved turned him against Christmas, which just happens to be the nasally distinctive Whos’ favourite holiday, and shrunk his heart until it was two sizes too small. This means he has some major Ishoos to deal with, as our American cousins are wont to say. Therapy arrives in the toothsome form of Cindy Lou-Who, a little girl who reckons the Grinch can’t be as bad as the Whos make out, frets that the spirit of Christmas has been lost in a shopping frenzy (tie-in merchandise available in the foyer, folks!), and has a regrettable habit of breaking into song in that lispy, off-key little girl voice of hers, which only parents and senile pensioners could love. But not before The Grinch has resolved to make off with all the Whos’ presents, trees and baubles.
The 1966 Chuck Jones cartoon on which this version is based performs the festive function for Americans that The Snowman does for Brits. There’d be riots on the streets if it wasn’t unearthed each year. It also has the benefit of zipping through the story in just 26 minutes. Ron Howard’s bloated live-action update boasts terrific set design and retains a fair bit of the good non-doctor’s marvellous wordplay, with added modish adult quips and asides from Jim Carrey, who plays the Grinch like a combination of The Mask and barking lounge singer Tony Clifton from Man on the Moon. Quite why they paid him so much money to take on the role remains a mystery, as he’s completely unrecognisable behind the green fur and yellow eyes. The Nightmare Before Christmas, which this most closely resembles, was darker and sharper, but you have to hand it to a story that suggests there’s more to Christmas than conspicuous consumption without once mentioning Christianity.
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