I've seen a lot of stinker movies but this takes the cake. There is no chemistry between any of the characters and the movie never made me laugh. Usually I'm willing to give some leeway to holiday movies, but not this one. I thought it would never end.I blame the poorly written script. There is nothing a director or actors could do to improve it. The movie in contrived and rushed. Every scene seems plastic and one dimensional. I prefer Jingle All The Way more than this movie; and that movie was terrible.

I was actually nice and gave it a 2 star rating. I like Jamie Lee Curtis, but her acting in this film was flat out awful! I can't believe the director of this film didn't fire her while filming. It's such a stupid plot, two married couple decide to skip Christmas one year and go somewhere tropical. So the entire neighborhood flips out and does everything to stop them because the Kranks won't decorate their home with holiday lights and this massive sized snowman that everyone puts on their roof. I cringe every time I see it on TV! It also has a bizarre mix of cast members. No chemistry and bad acting all around. Tim Allen didn't even seem like he was into his character.

I can't understand all the negativity from so many people about this film. This is basically a slapstick comedy, and aspires to be little more than that, with perhaps a bit of a moral at the end regarding selfishness. But it wasn't meant to be "The Importance of Being Earnest" or "You Can't Take It With You" or even "Some Like It Hot". The fact that it doesn't rise to Grisham's book's level is totally unimportant to almost anyone unless he or she has read the book. Even then, though, a film must be accepted or rejected, hated or enjoyed, based on its own inherent quality. A lot of book critics thought "Gone With the Wind" an overrated book, and then decried the classic film version as not being worthy of the book. Come on, now! This film was a lot of fun from beginning to end, with some exceedingly funny scenes and performances that made me laugh out loud (mostly from Curtis), and with no dead spots. It also contains a certain amount of sentimentality towards the end, but hell, it's a Christmas movie - should it have ended like "Night of the Living Dead"? The lead performances of Tim Allen and Jamie Lee Curtis really make the film, and they are ideally cast as polar opposites in the acting department. Allen is forever low-key and rather accepting of his fate, while Curtis is almost the Bette Davis of slapstick, and over the top in almost every second scene, but to these eyes and ears hilariously and appropriately so. The best actors, comedians, opera singers, etc. can make a special art of going over the top (think of John Barrymore, Tod Slaughter, Boris and Bela, Gregory Peck as Ahab, Eleanor Parker, Faye Dunaway, Mario Del Monaco and, of course, Ms. Davis). Curtis has been one of that elect company in everything from her early years in slasher films (what actress ever expressed more believable fear and horror in such unworthy fare?) to the hilarious housewife of an Arnold Schwarzenegger secret agent (what secret agent's wife was ever funnier?). But she is FUNNY, and Tim Allen is FUNNY, and that is exactly what they're supposed to be. This isn't Shakespeare and the director isn't David Lean. It is a slapstick comedy and must be accepted as such, and judged on whether or not it does the job. For me, it does the job superbly, and I would just mention that even the actors who are called upon to play it straight here, or even slightly dramatic, like M. Emmett Walsh and Elizabeth Franz, are totally credible (but when has Mr. Walsh ever not been frighteningly real?). So, if you can enjoy the film for what it is, and take note that the kids are probably greatly enjoying every minute of it, and that everyone around you is laughing as well, that's surely all the director and the actors ever strove for. As Clint Eastwood might have said, "Go ahead. Watch the film. Make your day!"

In my review I discuss the general plot, but I try not to give away any specific events or spoilers. However, I marked the review as "containing" spoilers just in case my discussion of the plot details is too much for those wanting to watch "completely fresh."I had the feeling while watching this movie is that Luther Krank (Tim Allen) is supposed to be a version of Scrooge. In Dicken's classic novel, Scrooge is both the villain and protagonist. He is mean and you dislike him, but he learns a lesson and ultimately changes. However, unlike with Scrooge, I sympathized very strongly with Luther Krank. After years of celebrating Christmas with his daughter, all he wants to do is take a vacation with his wife now that she has grown up and moved away. But his neighbours and peers, who are some sort of weird cult-like Christmas version of the Stepford Wives, harass and bully him to no end. Therefore watching this movie I didn't want Luther Krank to change. I didn't want him to give in and bend to the wishes of his horrifically creepy and annoying neighbours (who should have been charged for trespassing and harassment). I completely recognized his right to be "selfish" and live his life for his own sake rather than the sake of his community who have no business interfering with his desires. I do not think it is a spoiler to say that, predictably, Luther Krank learns a lesson and changes his ways at the end of the movie. However it is the wrong lesson. In Christmas with the Kranks the bad-guys win. I think the movie might have been originally intended as a horror movie instead of a family Christmas movie, a theory supported by both the evil neighbourhood and the fact that Jamie Lee Curtis was cast as co- star. Perhaps if you watch it as such, it won't be so awful.