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A BAD MOMS CHRISTMAS – WHAT HAPPENED TO THANKSGIVING?

thedhk
Happy November 1st! Halloween has come and gone and now it’s time for us to prepare for the next major holiday in the US… Thankg…. Christmas? Apparently according to Hollywood and retailers everywhere which already had their Christmas decorations ready to go (I kid you not I saw Christmas candy – which I maintain isn’t a real thing, and Halloween candy on the same shelf at my local CVS) before kids had even finished their trick or treating.

Every year it feels Christmas creeps up earlier and earlier, but this was the first year I can recall where a film with such a Christmas dependent theme debuted so far in advance of turkey day. I personally am not a huge fan of Christmas films, or quite frankly Christmas in general.

However, A Bad Moms Christmas opened today, which is unexpected considering Wednesday openings are usually reserved for actual holiday weekends, or super blockbuster events. I admittedly have a soft spot for the first Bad Moms film, so I dragged myself to the first matinee showing out of morbid curiosity. ​

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Kathryn Hahn as Carla, Mila Kunis as Amy, and Kristen Bell as Kiki – STX Entertainment
.Sure there are film exceptions that I love, Love Actually, A Muppet Christmas Carol, and Die Hard for starters. However the more conglomerates, studios, and seemingly society in general, try to shove the Noel down my throat, the more I find I rebel against the festive cheer (call me a Grinch or Scrooge if you’d like). Ironically A Bad Moms Christmas does play upon the stresses of the holiday season in the plot. It does a decent job of capturing the seemingly insurmountable pressure associated with the end of the year.

Is Thanksgiving just no longer bankable as a plot point? Is it because it doesn’t involve spending copious amounts of money on gifts and therefore is less appealing than it’s commercialized fellow winter celebration? Is it because it’s an American holiday and Christmas has its hooks in a more worldwide audience? The past few years have seen a decline in films set around Thanksgiving, yet this year alone we can look forward to a handful more Yuletide films to come (I won’t even get started on the amount of content Hallmark pumps out around this time of year)

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Justin Hartley as Ty Swindel – STX Entertainment
Do the filmmakers of A Bad Moms Christmas expect the hysteria surrounding the season to carry their film through the 2 entire months leading up to the actual holiday? I think the plot of the movie could have been managed without centering around a festivity that confines it to being only seasonable once a year, yet for some reason they choose not to.

As I brace for the onslaught of the rest of what appears to be a painfully long holiday season the one thing I will look forward to about Christmas is figuring out what movie I’ll see instead of celebrating, and where I’ll be ordering Chinese food from.