This was supposed to be the last post, but apparently my feelings about notepad were just too strong and worked their way to the surface. (That post is doomed to zero instances of lavish praise.) But this one is all about Christmas quality. I've often commented to Shannon the following American culture truth:
People will accept a startling level of crappiness from products and still love them, just because it's Christmas.
Exhibit A: 98% of all Christmas music. Some crummy vocalist can get his family steel drum band together and go record "Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree" and suddenly you're listening to it on the radio. There's such a demand for this stuff that they start playing Christmas music November 1st. What if crummy-steel-drum-band-man went and recorded his own version of "Video Killed the Radio Star"? Would that get air time? If it did, would you listen to it? Most Christmas music is done by poor to average vocalists with formulaic music. If you really look at it, the tunes and lyrics themselves are usually pretty awful. "Jingle Bell Rock" "Feliz Navidad" "Upon the Housetop"? If these songs were about anything other than Christmas they never even would have been written.
Exhibit B: Christmas Movies and TV shows. The Charlie Brown Christmas is a classic. And that's about it. Many will defend the original Rudolph TV production, but really, if that wasn't somehow entrenched as the greatest Christmas time TV show ever, would anyone still like it? (We all like it and watch it because we've been told that everyone likes it.) Frosty the Snowman isn't bad, but would take a big hit without the "Happy Birthday!" line every time he's brought back to life. The movie "The Christmas Story" is a good flick and then we've just about exhausted Christmas films. Yet every year someone has to star in a terrible Christmas movie where people learn to have the Christmas spirit and old enemies become friends. Any don't try to punch holes in this argument with pseudo-Christmas movies like "Home Alone". It takes place at Christmas time, but really, there's no reason it couldn't have been done over spring break. The scary guy next door would just have to be fertilizing his lawn rather than salting the walks. The heartwarming "we made it back for Christmas" scene would have been weakened a bit, but really, the film is about being home alone, not Christmas.
Exhibit C: Handy-Nerd stocking stuffers. (If you don't know what this is, ask. Maybe it'll have to be it's own post.)
My pledge this Christmas season is not to endure any low quality tripe just because it's Christmas tripe. Enjoy the good quality stuff out there, but don't settle for things you'd never endure the other 11 months of the year.
4 comments:
My favorite Christmas movie is Die Hard!
Ok, you did leave out two movies, that, in my opinion are not tripe and get me in the holiday spirit. First is Christmas Vacation. I am sorry, but that movie is freaking hilarious and just wouldn't work for any other time of the year. The other is the Classsic It's a Wonderful Life. That is the best Christmas movie out there in my opinion. I am right there with you on Home Alone though. I could go without ever seeing it again although we watched the last half of the movie with Brett's family last weekend, so I guess I don't get my wish on that one.
As far as music, there's a lot of junk out there that more people can get away from, but on the flip side, if you get really good Christmas music, it's some of the very best music there is. We went to Music and the Spoken Word last Sunday, and hearing the Tabernacle Choir perform O Come, O Come Emmanual was out of this world, so you have to take some of the worst with some of the best.
Clark has never seen It's a Wonderful Life. That's why he forgot it. Can you believe that?
And I think Home Alone is fantastic, I don't know what the problem is there. "I am upstairs, dummy." Classic cinema, if you ask me.
I don't have a problem with Home Alone, it just isn't a Christmas movie, merely a movie that takes place at christmas time.
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