We all know and love this movie so I don’t have to say much about this classic. You watch it EVERY Christmas, and when you have a Christmas without it, you feel some type of way. I want us all to stop and thank Chris Columbus for all the classics he’s given us. Don’t know what they are? Let me tell you. The Goonies, Gremlins, Mrs. Doubtfire, the first two Harry Potter movies, and Rent. All but Rent are movies that have been apart of my life for YEARS! Never knew they were all directed by the same man. I just wanted to make sure that we gave this man his flowers.
First and foremost, we have been asking for years how much the McCallisters made. Funny enough, I don’t think the filmmakers thought about the fact that we, as normal people struggling in this world, would want to know much it cost to heat that house in the winter. This is a typical question my grandma would ask when she saw a house like that. It’s a question that comes up throughout the year and I just found an article that gives some insight into this dilemma, but it only speculates. Still no concrete answers on this. If you take out the fact that they are a 15 member family traveling to Paris, the McCallisters had 5 kids themselves. What did they do to support these kids?! As we can see, Kevin is a lot himself. I can only imagine the other kids.
Second, Mrs. McCallister, we will need you at the front of the congregation. Now, I know and I hear you. It was an easy mistake, given the circumstances, but ma’am, these are your 5 kids that you have every single day of your life. I don’t have any kids, but any time I go out with my friend who has 5 kids, I am hyper aware of where every kid is. I would like to know how the most annoying kid you have you forgot. If anything, Kevin would have been asking someone 100 questions like my favorite neighbor kid that they counted instead of Kevin. Where are his parents at that time of morning? Why is he outside harassing the driver of this van? Yes. Kevin has a dad, but to be honest, I don’t trust Kevin’s dad to be responsible. He doesn’t seem like he’s the decision maker in the family. He seems like a “Ask-your-mom” kind of dad.
Harry and Marv, I get you really want to rob this house. Harry more so than Marv but I digress. Either way, I would like to know your motivation for continuing to try and rob this house when you learn that there is an 8-year-old home alone in this house. If caught robbing these houses, you would have already been going down for that, but somehow, you wanted to add child endangerment charges to the party (even though the child was a danger to you in the end). At a certain point, you wanted the kid and not the stuff in the house, Why? I never understood that. Leave this kid alone. He is the definition of “The Wrong One.”
Kevin, these men should be dead. Somehow they aren’t, but you basically killed these men several times in this movie. My favorite “death”scene was when Marv caught Kevin by the pants. Kevin grabs his brother’s tarantula and places it so nicely on Marv’s chest. The scream he scrumpt is THE BEST! It’s a part of wait for and laugh at every time. Also, it should be noted that Joe Pesci is used to doing films where he could cuss like Samuel L. Jackson. In this film, he could not, so when you hear him grumbling after being hit with something or burning his hand on the doorknob, that is why he is making that noise. It’s to stifle his cursing.
Buzz, your story was dumb. How could Old Man Marley have killed an entire block of people and just be living across the street? Make a better story, man!
Last but not least, if you are a household who has your family watch this every year, I have a tip for you. Remember the scene where Kevin is making groceries? (yes, making groceries. I’m Southern. You make ‘em. Leave me be.) The lady checking him out had a lot of questions for him. In her defense, you can tell she’s supposed to be concerned about this kid in her checkout line seemingly alone, but HAVE YOUR KIDS WATCH THIS SCENE CLOSELY. She asks him all these questions and Kevin is clever enough to have an answer for each of her questions…except the last one. She asks him where he lives and he says he can’t tell her that. The reason why? BECAUSE SHE’S A STRANGER. I laugh every time, but I remember my mom making that a lesson for me. I’m almost 32-years-old and I don’t even like telling strangers my real name, to be completely honest. Use that scene like my mom did as a lesson to either not talk to strangers or to no divulge your personal life to someone you don’t know. Stuck with me, so maybe it will stick with you.
Marv, the “Wet Bandits” thing…it goes hand in hand with the child endangerment charges. I know he wasn’t the smart one, but still. Why was that your calling card? You could have done anything! Smashed a window. Wrote your name in the closet door. Anything but flooding a house. If I had found out that it was you and Harry who hit my house AND it was flooded, I’m coming to bail you out only to beat you up.
Alright, one last thing. Forreal this time. The time Old Man Marley and Kevin spent in the church is so heartwarming. Kids really do put certain stuff into perspective for us adults. We make things so complicated when it doesn’t really have to be, and you get all of that in that scene. All it took was Marley to call his boy and ask for him. I’m sure it was more than that but to pick up the phone was a start. I bet his son was just waiting for the call anyway, and all it took was a brief conversation with an 8-year-old who thought his father was a murdered of a whole block.
Tell me, what’s your favorite scene from this classic? Here is one me and my mom quote almost daily! Joe Pesci yelling, “From a treehouse” gets us every single time!
