Noelle (2019)

I'm starting this year's Christmas movie marathon with a new film that just released: Noelle (2019)

SYNOPSIS:
"Santa" is a title passed down for over 2,000 years, and when the current Santa passes away, it's up to his eldest son, Nick Kringle (Bill Hader), to take on the role. However, Nick doesn't want anything to do with the "family business," and when his sister, Noelle Kringle (Anna Kendrick), suggests he take a brief vacation to de-stress, he does just that... and doesn't return. Now it's up to Noelle to find her brother and set everything right, just days before Christmas!

REVIEW:
This was a very fun film! Anna Kendrick is one of my all-time favorite actresses and she did a wonderful job in this film. She juggles the role of responsible adult, childlike wonder, self-doubting, and awkward social interactions outside of the North Pole. I was kind of sad that they had at least two solo female songs in this film and she didn't get to sing either, since she has a very talented singing voice too.

I was afraid at first that this was just going to be a sort of Will Ferrell "Elf" (2003) knock-off, with Noelle traveling to Phoenix, Arizona and awkwardly mingling with the local culture as she tries to track down a lost family member. But they did a good job of keeping it light and entertaining while not making it a straight-up comedy film like Elf. Any awkwardness was dealt with maturely and didn't leave you cringing, like Will Ferrell's style of "comedy."

Leave it to Disney to keep up the tradition of killing off a parent, though. But this time, they went for Santa Claus, right at the very beginning of a story about Santa! Do you know no shame?! Yes, the story's about replacing Santa, but still... at least they were respectful about his passing and didn't play it off as a joke or something.

Also, on a side-note, this movie is apparently a Disney+ exclusive, so if you don't have the new (awful) streaming service, you'll probably have to wait until Disney decides to sell DVDs or something. Or go sailing the great data seas. 😉

Apple must've thrown a lot of money at this film because the running joke throughout the film was that EVERYONE wanted an iPad. Regardless of what anyone wanted for Christmas, there was always an, "also, an iPad" thrown in there.

Speaking of electronics... while the main plot was moving forward, there was a side-plot where a cousin of Noelle's is granted the title of Santa and, being the head of the tech department for the North Pole, decides to automate the entire process. Deliver gifts via Amazon Prime! Use aggregated data online to scan for naughty/nice qualities! He planned to remove all the personal qualities of Santa and make it a well-greased mechanical process.

Being a tech guru myself, I was on board with the whole modernization idea at first, until he announced that his algorithms dictated there were only about 2,000 or so truly good kids in the world and everyone else got a notification on their smart phone telling them why they didn't meet the cut and better luck next year. Ouch!

I can't really talk about the end without spoiling it, but let's just say that Nick and Noelle grow as people throughout the story and it had a pretty satisfactory ending.

RECOMMENDATION:
I don't like making arbitrary rating scales, so I'll just give my recommendation instead. I enjoyed this light-hearted comedy about discovering the true meaning of Christmas and I would recommend anyone see it! There was plenty of holiday cheer, it focuses on all aspects of good will and kindness to all, and even treated religions that don't believe in Christmas with respect. Definitely go check it out!

Christmas Movie Marathon 2019

My wife and I are starting the Christmas movie marathon a day early with holiday-themed mini-sodas and my first film to review!

We're getting ready to move soon, so I dunno if I have time to marathon a new movie every day this month, but I'll try to review as many as I can! I'll post today's review when I'm done watching this film. 😉

In the meantime, here's a brief review of these two holiday sodas:

I expected the Cinnamon Coca-Cola to have a hint of cinnamon sugar flavoring to it, but no... It was like drinking a ground up cinnamon stick! Very strong! But after a few of these, I've gotten used to it and I really like it!

The Winter-Spiced Cranberry Sprite is really good! They usually release a cranberry Sprite around Thanksgiving every year, but I've never heard of a "winter-spiced" version before. I don't know if there's anything different or if it's just a new marketing name, but it's still a very good flavoring.

I'd recommend both!

Dora and the Lost City of Gold (2019)

It's been a while since I reviewed a movie, so let's start it up again with Dora and the Lost City of Gold (2019)

Dora is a teenage girl who spent her youth growing up in the South American jungle. When her professor/explorer parents finally discover the location of the lost city of gold, they decide to send Dora off to high school in America instead of letting her tag along on the dangerous adventure. But others are looking for the city of gold, and they're willing to kidnap Dora and her new high school friends in exchange for the location of the city.

This film starts out exactly like a live-action Dora episode. A 6-year old Dora and her best friend Diego are off on a wild jeep adventure in the jungle, with a talking backpack and map, and Swiper the Fox trying to steal from them. Then it cuts to "reality" and we see the kids playing in a cardboard box outside Dora's jungle home. Diego and his family are moving to "the city" and the kids say their goodbyes to each other.

Then the movie takes a turn from the cartoon show and jumps ahead to Dora's teen years, where she's still "adventuring" in the jungle. She finds out that her parents have finally found the lost city of gold, but they're reluctant to bring her along because she's still too young. They send her to "the city" in America, to live with Diego's family. And so begins her awkward attempt to "study the indigenous people" of high school.

The trailer for this movie made Dora seem eccentric and out-of-place in normal society, but a confident explorer and always in control. The movie, on the other hand, shows Dora as an odd child, even by her parents' standards. She lacks social skills and is inappropriately personal with everyone she sees.
She does this thing from the old cartoon where she'll explain a fact, then stare at the camera and say, "Can YOU say (thing she described)?" All while her parents are looking around the room awkwardly and whispering to each other, "It's just a phase; she'll grow out of it."

Her optimism is through the roof and her lack of social grace makes for some really painful scenes to sit through. Teenage Diego channels the audience, as he's constantly trying to reel her in. He explains to her that he's just struggling to survive high school and her presence is ruining his "street cred". But he fails to get through to her, as she cares more about being positive with everyone than trying to find common ground to relate to anyone.

Then Dora gets kidnapped by some treasure hunters who plan to use her to find the lost city of gold, and Dora, Diego, and two of their classmates end up shipped back to the jungle in a crate. They escape thanks to the help of a friend of Dora's parents, and go on their own jungle quest to track down her folks.

The rest of the movie is spent exploring the jungle while the classmates whine about not going home. There was a bizarre scene where Dora and Diego get drugged by an exotic plant's spores and start hallucinating that they're cartoon characters, which brings on a literal Dora cartoon scene in the middle of this live-action movie.

Oh! And Swiper the fox is apparently a real thing! No explanation whatsoever for his presence. Some of the kids even comment on the fact that there's a random talking fox wearing a mask. He's apparently working with the treasure hunters. And there was little effort put into his appearance as well; he reminded me of the stop-motion foxes from the film Fantastic Mr. Fox (2009).

If you grew up with Dora cartoons (I didn't), you might enjoy this rendition of a teenage Dora. But for the most part, there were a lot of cringey scenes that dragged on way too long, including one where an adult ugly cries because he almost died, while the kids whisper about how awkward it is when adults cry.

I'd recommend giving this a one-time view, but good luck sitting through it twice! If you want a fun live-action Dora movie, I'd recommend watching the fake trailer made by College Humor instead, which is likely what sparked interest in making this movie in the first place.

Sonic the Hedgehog (2020)

They did it! They fixed Sonic! Thanks to the main man, Tyson Hesse for helping redesign Sonic's look (he's one of the main artists for the modern Sonic comic books).

This movie actually looks interesting now. I'm excited for its release on Valentine's Day.