The Goods: Film ReviewsThe threads are uneven in both screentime emphasis and quality, but as a teen-focused Love Actually riff, it works well enough. The cast is really delightful overall. In ten years, there will be one or two names here that are stars and make us say “man, remember when *whomever* was in a straight-to-Netflix romcom with a zillion other teens?”
I’m not wild about the character designs, but my biggest complaint is that the movie leans too much into abstracting the Victorian London setting during the ghostly encounters. The best Christmas Carols are great costume dramas on top of all the other fun stuff. Still, it’s a competent and enjoyable musical adaptation as a reworked take on 1970’s Scrooge.
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Unhinged. Horrifying. Totally outlandish. It doesn’t make any sense that this premise could ever occur, even with Santa magic, which is part of the reason it’s so fun and morbid to watch it unfold. Compelling apocalyptic stuff for Sesame Street.
Feels like a jumbo-sized, special-edition episode of Sesame Street in the best way possible. There’s a fun ice skating segment and some terrific musical numbers. The stories eschew simple holiday sweetness in favor of slightly edgier material — like a crisis of faith by Big Bird.
I watched this in prep for our podcast episode on Anna and the Apocalypse, available on the special edition Blu Ray. It has really good background info on the movie, but is really only worth watching for enthusiasts, made entirely of talking heads rather than behind-the-scenes footage.
A fun little student project that led to Anna and the Apocalypse. The High School Musical parody factor is much more obvious here than in the resulting feature.
Less than the sum of its parts, but this exact combination of parts is at least pretty unique: this is a *takes breath* Christmas zombie teen drama musical comedy. It’s got a unique Scottish flavor and an unhinged villain with a few great scenes, but has trouble keeping track of its identity or getting its characters to stick.
One of the only Christmas Carol reinventions that has really worked for me. The sense of terror is gone, and the CGI is as ugly as any of the Barbie movies (very), but there’s a lot of thought and heart into this telling that transforms Scrooge (i.e. Eden Starling) into a vain theater star.
So witty and utterly beautiful as an Austen adaptation that all the rest look a bit stiff by comparison. Anya Taylor-Joy is spellbinding as the title character; Mia Goth is possibly even better. A thrill and a joy, especially the production, especially especially the costumes.