Today's Feature: Sleigh Bells Ring
A magic sleigh nudges a single mother back to an old flame.
I don't know what's even going on anymore. Is this really happening? I watched something called Sleigh Bells Ring, and it was a movie about a magic sleigh, and how it magically brought two people together after they've spent years apart and whatnot, but I also saw this movie the other day, and the day before that, an the day before that. It's the same damned movie I've been watching since December 1st, just coming around again and again, skipping back to the start like a scratched record.
The most popular premise for these movies involves two schmucks who were in love once upon a time, before one of them just abruptly leaves for reasons, leaving the other schmuck to pick up the pieces and move on with their life in their picturesque hometown. At least one of them has at least one dead parent. There's also a kid in there somewhere, and the kid just wants their mommy or daddy to find somebody who loves them so they're not always alone.
Some tired plot contrivance brings the two schmucks back together, and they try to fight their mutual attraction for a little while as they try to save the community center or whatever, and as soon as they both realize they can't fight their feelings anymore, some ridiculous obstacle raises its head, forcing the schmucks apart once again. Then the obstacle just resolves itself in the space of one or two quick scenes, and the schmucks get back together just in time for a kiss before that cozy fade to black.
Spoiler alert, but that's the entire plot to Sleigh Bells Ring, except Santa Claus is the one responsible for the tired plot contrivance that brings this film's two schmucks, a parks & recreation manager named Laurel and a hot shot glue factory executive named Alex, back together. And that's only been the premise of, let's see, just five of the other movies I've watched this year, not to mention seven of the movies from last year, so it's not played out or anything like that. No, that's fucking evergreen, right there.
Is it me? Is there something wrong with me? Who can just keep watching the exact same plot played out again and again with only the most minor of variations and still enjoy it so much? This is why I've never been a big fan of all of those procedural television dramas, like Bones and The Mentalist or the endless Law & Order variants, It's the same shit every time. I guess it's like comfort food for people; the familiarity is pleasing to them.
But at least on those programs the viewer can watch the characters change and grow over time, even if you know they're going to solve the case at the end of each episode. These movies don't have that luxury. These are the same people, drifting through the same plot in every single movie, and only their faces look any different, except when the same actors and actresses keep returning year after to year to star in a "new" movie that's exactly the same as the "old" movie they starred in from the previous year.
But Sleigh Bells Ring isn't like the other movies at all. It's different because this plot revolves around restoring an antique sleigh in time for the small town's big Christmas parade, and Laurel's old flame Alex is on holiday vacation from his cushy gig at the glue factory upstate to help his beloved Aunt Audrey sell her old curio shop, and after discovering the sleigh parked in front of the shop after it mysteriously disappeared from Laurel's trailer across town, he insists on helping his ex-lover restore the creaky old contraption, and as they work on the magical sleigh they both realize that they're still in love, and eventually Alex decides not to go back to the glue factory, staying in cozy little Mission City to run his Aunt Audrey's antique shop while he spends more quality time with Laurel and her smiling prop of a daughter named Billy, because they're always named Billy, and that's not at all like the plots of any of the other movies I've seen this month.
It's Santa's sleigh! That's why it's different. Santa's sleigh pushes the two schmucks together, because of the magic of Christmas! Nobody has ever seen a movie like this in the history of cinema. Christmas magic. Dead parents. Kissing. Billy. I'm pretty sure Billy's father hanged himself in the perfect little garage of their perfect little house on their perfect little street in their perfect little town. Billy's father is lucky. Because Billy's father is free. He's not trapped in this cinematic Möbius strip, doomed to repeat the same crushing nightmare of a plot hiding behind a hastily painted-on smile that resembles more and more the mocking rictus grin of death itself the more you see it.
Oh, but Sleigh Bells Ring is different because it's Alex who gives up his high-paying career for a simpler life in his hometown with the woman he loves, instead of Laurel, who just gets a promotion from the mayor for doing such a good job organizing the Christmas parade. Usually it's the woman who has to abandon her career for love in these movies. So I guess Sleigh Bells Ring is different, after all. That's fantastic. I don't want to give you the wrong idea, because Sleigh Bells Ring isn't a bad movie. It's well made and well acted, and if I had seen it a little earlier in the month, I'm sure I would have honestly enjoyed the experience of watching the movie. But hitting me on Christmas Eve? I've just had my fill of this simplistic product. I'm the problem in this scenario, not the movie, which fulfills its seasonal obligations in a perfectly adequate manner.
I just want to throw up that picture of the crucified Santa Claus again and be done with this whole sorry exercise, I really do. I know I sure as hell can't take another one of these pathetic, family-friendly romances. I just can't do it to myself anymore. It was fun for about a week, but how many different ways can you say the same damned thing? I've reached my limit, I know that much. But tomorrow is Christmas Day, and I've come this far. One more movie. But what movie? It has to be something special, something perfect for the blessed occasion. Eh, I'm sure I'll figure something out.
VERDICT: YOU BETTER WATCH OUT
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