Hi everyone, and happy New Year from the Nightcrawler Experience!
Well, another Christmas has come and gone, but I still have a little gift for you all, as I look at a Christmas classic: 'Home Alone'!
(Credit for this image goes to the user Manja Scheibe on the 20th Century Studios wiki at https://20thcenturystudios.fandom.com/wiki/Home_Alone?file=Home_alone_ver2.jpg)
I'm sure pretty much all of you have probably seen this. Made in 1990, it was directed by Chris Columbus, written and produced by the late John Hughes, and stars Catherine O'Hara, Joe Pesci, Daniel Stern, and of course Macaulay Culkin in the role that made him famous (For about 4 or 5 years, anyway, before the "Former child star" curse hit him hard; Thankfully, he's rebuilt his career as a cult- movie actor in more recent years, even having a supporting role in the current hit 'Zootopia 2').
We start with the McAllister family, a large and wealthy extended family from Chicago, planning a big vacation to go to Paris for Christmas. The night before they are to leave, their 8- year- old son Kevin (Culkin) has an altercation with his boorish bully of an older brother, Buzz (The ultimate epitome of the mean older brother so many kids have), which leaves the family angry at him and Kevin so furious at them in turn that he openly says he never wants to see any of them again. A power outage that night resets the family's alarm clocks, causing them to unwittingly sleep in, and in their consequent mad rush to get to the airport in time for their flight, they unwittingly leave Kevin behind (He had been sleeping alone in the attic and apparently unwoken by their rush to get out the door).
When Kevin's mom Kate (O'Hara) discovers her son is missing, she begins frantically trying to find a way to get home to him. She boards one flight after another, growing ever more desperate as time goes on, before finally getting a ride from a polka band leader (The late, great John Candy, who's his usual jolly, friendly self here) for the last leg of the trip home.
During this time, their house and the other houses in the rather affluent neighborhood they live in are targeted by Harry and Marv (Pesci and Stern), two cruel yet idiotic cat burglars nicknamed "The Wet Bandits" for Marv's habit of leaving the water running in the houses they rob. The burglars know most of that affluent neighborhood's families are going to be out on vacation (Harry had posed as a police officer to case the houses in the beginning of the movie and figure out which families would be gone), and are planning on plundering every last one of them in the space of a few days, regarding Kevin's house as the juiciest target of them all.
However, amidst these subplots, Kevin remains the star and focal point of the movie. He is at first overjoyed to have the house to himself. He pigs out on junk food, rides his sled down a flight of stairs and out the front door, and gets into other sorts of mischief. You also see, though, that he is scared of a lot of things; Scared of the weird- sounding furnace in his basement, scared of an elderly, snow- shoveling neighbor named "Old Man Marley" whom Buzz told him is a serial killer, and most of all scared of Harry and Marv when he discovers their intentions.
Eventually, however, Kevin learns self- reliance and how to be brave. He goes shopping by himself, befriends Old Man Marley who turns out to be a kindly yet misunderstood gentleman who has his own experience of feeling estranged from his family, and decides to defend his home from Harry and Marv (Who have by this point discovered that he is alone in the house) by setting up an impressive array of makeshift booby traps to fight them off.
Ultimately, of course, the burglars are defeated and brought to justice, Kevin is reunited with his mother and the rest of his family on Christmas morning, and Old Man Marley is reunited with his own family.
'Home Alone' does have some problems. First, right off the bat, the whole scenario involving how the family left Kevin behind seems a bit off. A) Even in the mad rush they were in to get to the flight in time, wouldn't one of the other members of the family have noticed Kevin was missing sooner (i.e. Before they boarded the plane)? B) You'd think that the sound of everyone stampeding around the house in a rush to get ready and get out the door would have woken up Kevin. Another problem is that, while most of the booby traps in the climax seemed to work well at hurting the burglars or at least slowing them down, one of the traps Kevin sets simply involved hooking up a wire and a fan to blow a bunch of feathers into Harry's face. Admittedly, it's kind of funny to see, but it doesn't hurt Harry or slow him down at all, you'd think a creative kid like Kevin could have come up with something a little stronger than that.
That being said, there's a reason why Home Alone' did so well in the box office and remains a holiday classic to this day. It really is a great movie. The plot hits all the right notes without becoming too corny.
Obviously, the main highlight of the film is the last half- hour or so when Kevin is using the booby traps to fight off Harry and Marv. Some of the traps are simple (i.e. Kevin pours a bucket of water on the steps leading up to his front door so it'll freeze into a thin layer of ice and become ultra- slippery, then does the same to the stairs leading down to the basement door), others are slightly more complicated (i.e. the aforementioned fan/ feather trap), but all are a lot of fun to see in action.
My personal favorite of the traps HAS to be when Kevin rigs up the back door with a small blowtorch that sets Harry's head on fire when he tries to come in; between the very nature of the trap itself, the setup to it (i.e. Harry has by that point been hit with a couple traps already, and so he approaches the door very carefully, makes sure that the same traps aren't waiting for him at that door, and then confidently strides in, only for the blowtorch to be waiting for him), and Joe Pesci's awesome reaction to it, to this day I laugh hard at that scene. In addition to the traps, Kevin has also "borrowed" a pellet gun from Buzz's room that he puts to good use.
As far as acting goes, Macaulay Culkin does a quite good job as Kevin. You really can see through his performance how much Kevin has changed/ grown over the course of the film; From the helpless (Terrified of even the concept of packing his suitcase for the trip as he'd never done so before), rather bratty and selfish kid seen in the beginning, to the brave, self- reliant, and compassionate boy seen in the climax and ending. A good example of this is when he befriends Old Man Marley. Meeting him at a Christmas Eve church service (Marley was there to see his granddaughter sing in the church's youth choir, as that's apparently the only chance he'd have to see her), they get to talking, and realize they have a lot in common, as they both know what it's like to feel estranged from loved ones due to petty squabbles. Kevin reminds Mr. Marley that he shouldn't let fear and grudges keep him from reaching out to his family again, and points out that, although his brother and the rest of his family can annoy him at times, that doesn't mean he loves them any less. The Kevin we saw at the beginning of the film wouldn't have said anything like that, it shows the change he's gone through from his time home alone.
Catherine O'Hara turns in a wonderful supporting performance as Kevin's mom. You can really sympathize with her in every scene she's in; Between her impatience with Kevin and getting ready for the trip in the beginning of the film, through how increasingly stressed- out she is to get home to him throughout the rest of the movie while being thwarted at every turn by police and others who are either too incompetent or too apathetic to help her. You really want to see this desperate woman reunite with her son, and when it finally happens in the very end of the movie, it's worth all the trouble she went through.
Joe Pesci and Daniel Stern make for great villains as Harry and Marv. Between how mean and nasty they are in some scenes (Both at how callously they trash the houses they rob, and at how much they terrorize an eight- year- old child) and how stupid and hilarious they are in other scenes, they're always fun to watch and play off each other perfectly. The two of them sort of remind me of evil versions of Moe and Larry from the Three Stooges, between Harry's short- fused aggression and Marv's almost childlike stupidity. They also have great screams of pain/ fear, especially Stern (The scream he gives when Kevin places Buzz's pet tarantula on his face makes me burst out laughing for quite a while; Apparently that scream was 100% ad- libbed, as Stern hadn't been told in advance that the spider would be placed on his face).
Another highlight of 'Home Alone' that I never really noticed as a kid or paid much attention to was the music. It has quite a good score, by legendary composer John Williams (Of 'Star Wars' fame). The most commonly used parts of it are the pretty and heartwarming Christmas-ey song "Somewhere In My Memory" and its instrumental rendition that's used as sort of like Kevin's theme, and the more dark and ominous music used as the burglars' theme. The movie offers some quite good variations on those two themes, to match the mood of each scene they're used in. Another great use of music occurs late in the film; In the end of the aforementioned scene when Kevin befriends Old Man Marley at the church service, he hears the church bells chiming the hour, reminding him that he needs to hustle home so he can set everything up before the burglars arrive. The music at that point transitions beautifully from the familiar "Carol of the Bells" (Which the church's youth choir was singing at the time) to the intense instrumental music for the scene when Kevin's setting all the traps.
There are quite a few Scriptural messages that can be taken from 'Home Alone.' One of the most obvious is on the importance of forgiveness and reconciliation. Kevin and his family (Especially his mom) learn to forgive each other for their past mistakes. It culminates in a heart- warming moment in the very end when Kevin and his mom are reunited. She starts telling him how sorry she is that she left him behind, but he just breaks into a huge grin and runs to hug her, having completely forgiven her for everything. The subplot with Old Man Marley helps further drive home the message of forgiving and reconciling with loved ones. Seeing him joyously reunited with his family is another of the movie's highlights.
This is obviously a Biblical theme, as well. In Ephesians 4:32, Paul tells believers "Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you." Since God through Jesus's sacrifice has forgiven all of us for our many sins against Him, we too should forgive the people in our own lives who have wronged us, especially around Christmas. Holding onto grudges just wastes time and leads to unnecessary loneliness, like it did to Old Man Marley for so many years, while forgiving others can bring reconciliation and freedom. This makes it all the more fitting that the scene when Kevin meets up with Mr. Marley and convinces him to reach out to his son again takes place in a church.
The other major theological message to be taken from 'Home Alone' is on the nature of family. While Kevin initially enjoys his time home alone, he realizes that being with his family is much better and more fulfilling than a life of solitude. Our family can act as the first and most basic ministry that we as Christians have, and one that we should really treasure.
Many verses in Scripture stress the value of family and of caring for one another in general, such as Proverbs 17:17, Colossians 3:13-14, and 1 Peter 3:8. The subplot with Old Man Marley and how he returns to his family can also be seen as echoing the parable of the Prodigal Son in in Luke 15:11-32. Both stories show that no relationship is beyond repair, and that what was lost can be restored through love and forgiveness.
That about sums up my look at 'Home Alone,' a truly timeless Christmas classic that teaches equally timeless messages on forgiveness and the nature of family.
That's it for this edition of the Nightcrawler Experience. Stay tuned as I put together future entries.
Until then, happy New Year, stay safe and healthy, and may God bless you all!
