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If you looked at the poster of Saving Christmas and expected a fun family action comedy featuring the actor from “Growing Pains,” get ready to be disappointed. Kirk Cameron, the formerly popular teen actor turned born-again Christian, is off to save Christmas and what does he do? He stalls inside a car with his brother-in-law Christian (Darren Doane) and lectures to him and the audience about the true meaning of Christmas and the birth of Jesus. Saving Christmas is more about inflating Cameron’s ego than spreading the holiday cheer to all your friends. Despite being a Christian, Cameron contradicts his own religious philosophy of love and forgiveness and suggests that Saint Nicholas, the originator of Santa Claus, murdered heretics when not giving presents. I guess Cameron was trying to be ironic with his “Lord of the Ringsy” take on the figure, but instead it comes off as mean-spirited, especially in a Christmas movie. To be fair, the joke might have worked in a tongue-and-cheek sense, if the other characters weren’t so poorly-written. Christian is a one-dimensional Scrooge in the mud, the atheist conspirators contribute nothing and neither do any of the party-goers, including Kirk’s sister Bridgette, except a dance number. Seeing the characters’ lack of onscreen presence only adds to Kirk Cameron’s overlong sanctimonious preachiness; that’s me as a film lover in general. If Kirk Cameron is reading this post (I seriously doubt that he is), I apologize for being a “hater and atheist,” but Saving Christmas wasn’t very good.
(1 Hot Cocoa in a Mike Seaver Mug out of 5)
