Christmas at the Kringles Hits Theatres Friday, and Variety Calls It Awful

Christmas at the Kringles opens in theatres on Friday, October 30, and the first major review is a hard one. Variety called the film awful on both of its counts, comedy and horror, and said it is deeply cynical about the Christmas season and completely unfunny.

The film is a holiday comedy-horror, directed by Kevin Lewis and written by Zack Imbrogno. The New York Times lists its genres as action, comedy and horror, and gives its running time as 1 hour 38 minutes. It is rated R, so viewers under 17 need an adult with them in the United States.

The cast is led by Ron Livingston as Mark Severson, a father whose family is at the centre of the story. Rachel Bilson plays his wife, Julie, and Jack Jewkes plays their son, Bobby. Thomas Lennon and Arden Myrin play Nick and Carol Kringle. Donald Faison plays a neighbour named Daryl, and Rob Riggle plays a mall Santa. David Wain is also in the cast.

Slant Magazine reviewed the film earlier this month and described haphazard plotting and cheap humour. Its review is headlined around Livingston, who is the film's most recognisable name.

The film's own website takes a different tone. It describes the picture as a sleigh ride of hilarity and terror.

The release is a theatres-only run. The official site lists the October 30 date for cinemas, so audiences who want to see it on the big screen have a single weekend to do so for now. That is a small, quick window for a film that opens at the very end of October, when holiday titles usually build over several weeks.

For anyone choosing a Halloween-season night out, the pitch is easy to sum up. It is a Christmas movie with horror in it, a comedy with a sharp edge, and a cast of familiar television and film faces. Whether those ingredients work is the question the reviews have now taken up, and Variety has already answered it in the negative.

Opening-weekend box office figures will arrive once the first ticket sales are counted. Those numbers, not the reviews, will show how many people chose to go.