Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Hello and welcome back to Movie Deputy Reviews, where we interrogate movies in depth for their plot and their content and we look at a little bit of everything. And I'm sorry for the stinker of yesterday. That one. Yeah, there's bound to be those from time to time. And the one we're going to be talking about today is I'm going to kind of go a little bit off track with this. So just bear with me, please. Bear with me on this. The movie that we're going to be talking about today is called the Christmas Letter.
[00:00:33] And Christmas is my absolute favorite time of year. And I'm sitting here this morning looking at the clock and realizing that this review is going to go live in just a couple hours because I have not yet been to bed. It's just been one of those nights. And I have been sitting here in my office and trying to put together some stories to share on the Movie Deputy channel that would go a little bit more personal.
[00:00:59] And like I said, this is my favorite time of year. Christmas is my all time favorite holiday. But you know, it really shouldn't be. And movies like this kind of bring up forward why it really shouldn't be, at least for me in this movie. The big kind of focus of this movie is the little green monster that is within all of us. The thing of jealousy. Now, you may be wondering where I'm going with all that, but I see Happy Christmas movies. I see these happy, happy ever afters and happy endings.
[00:01:35] And growing up, that was not what I experienced. I'm not going to share all the sordid details, but I tear up. Not so much because it's just emotional, but because I know what it's like to want that.
[00:01:57] And in this story, we meet Joe Michaels and his family.
[00:02:03] This movie I am giving a tentative, innocent rating to. There are some stuff in here that's maybe not for the youngest of audiences. And a lot of the theme of the movie is not adult in any way, shape or form, but there's a little bit of language and stuff. But. And with Joe Michaels is when he's back in his youth, he has a pen pal. And for those too young to know what that is back in school years ago, and I think they did this through the 70s, 80s, 90s. I don't know if they still do it or not, but in elementary school you would get paired up with a pen pal. And this is somebody who could have been in another city, another state, another country, and you would exchange letters back and forth. They would be sent to the school and sent from the school. And these would be letters that you would exchange back and forth. And in Joe's case, he was corresponding with a gentleman named Clive Hammersmith over in Europe, and they, they kind of formed a lasting friendship that lasted long after their school years were up.
[00:03:11] But as you probably remember, the name of the movie is called the Christmas Letter. And every year, Clive sends this Christmas letter to all of his friends and all of his family. And it's about all of these grand things that him and his family have done and these travels and these celebrities and just the pish posh of the pish posh. And for Joe, I mean, he is barely making ends meet, just living on the low end of middle class.
[00:03:41] And just every time he gets one of these letters, he just focuses on how much his life doesn't measure up. Now, mind you, I can't say that anymore for my own life. Like I said, I'm going to kind of just go off track here a little bit along with this.
[00:03:57] I have been so blessed to come as far as I have in life. It's like, look at this. I started my own company 10 years ago and now look where we're at.
[00:04:06] But there are things that just stay with you. Certain pains from childhood, certain things, certain memories.
[00:04:14] And I am going to share a few of those as we get closer to Christmas. But I'm going to be sharing them on the Movie Deputy channel, which is where all of our bonus content is. But I will let you know right now, be prepared with the tissue because as hard as they are to share, they're going to be even harder to hear.
[00:04:34] So I hope you bear with me through all that. But with this, when we see Joe going through all of these, he is just determined to try to make some big memories with his family. And just as he's prepared to do that, life just throws him another basket of lemons and changes a perspective of something in his life that completely changes everything for him and his family.
[00:04:59] So in order to have any chance at making these dreams come true, he does something else that's very rash and very just. You're like, what in the world are you doing? But it puts their entire future at risk. But he is going to have.
[00:05:18] He wants to do something for an entire year so he can write this amazing Christmas letter back to Clive and go, look what my family did.
[00:05:28] And it's. The thing is, it's not about that. I always say life is about making memories.
[00:05:36] And what Joe had to learn the hard way is that that's really what life is about. And in doing so, he almost loses his family. So this is a bit of an emotional rollercoaster. I mean, I laughed, I cried.
[00:05:53] You'll recognize a few familiar faces in this story as Chevy Chase and a few other faces from back in the day are going to make an appearance. Now, mind you, this feels like it's almost a direct Christmas. Christmas Vacation, the classic Christmas movie. And it loosely is, but it's not directly tied to that. But like I said, you're going to recognize some faces.
[00:06:21] And honestly, it's kind of how some of the humor plays out. It's kind of right along that same path as well. So if you've ever been a fan of the National Lampoons movies, this is one that will definitely get your attention down. I will say I gave the Christmas letter a 5.5 out of 10 on the Deputy scale.
[00:06:42] For as awesome and as heartwarming as it is, it's equally as cringe. I mean, there's, there's being cheesy and then there's taking cheese to the whole next level with the crackers and the entire charcuterie board. And this is almost at that level with a few points. And like I said, it's. I'm giving it a very tentative, innocent rating on that, just because some of the content, you're just going, what? Why?
[00:07:11] Really?
[00:07:14] And I do want to touch on dedication that's in the credits of the movie. A lot of people, as soon as the credits start, they hit the off button or they hit the switch and like, if they're in the theater, they get up and leave at that point. So a lot of these never even get seen. But this one, just because of some of the familiar faces that you're going to see in the movie, makes a lot of sense. But it says, in loving memory of all of those who believed in us and encouraged us to Chevy Chase our dreams. Now, as I already mentioned, you're going to see him in the movie like sort of some other familiar faces. But this one is destined to be a classic. But in order for it to be a classic, people have to be aware that it exists in the first place. So I hope that you have time to check this out. It is available on instant video, and like I said, it's just one of those hidden gems that would be easily overlooked. And I hope that you take a chance on this one because I'm glad I did. But as always, you know which buttons to push to get the latest and greatest movie Deputy content. And as always, I'll be back soon. Bye.
