To be completely honest, Chevy treated me like dirt.

November 12, 2015 10:33 AM

Holy Cow, Home Alone Is 25! Remember Winnetka’s most famous big-screen family, the McCallisters—especially the resourceful son who got left behind? An oral history of one of the most beloved Christmas comedies ever made.
posted by almostmanda (48 comments total)

We'll be watching Home Alone as part of the Holiday Movie Club in FanFare on 7 DEC.
posted by the man of twists and turns at 10:37 AM on November 12, 2015 [4 favorites]

A close reading of the movie reveals political agendas
posted by The Whelk at 10:47 AM on November 12, 2015 [1 favorite]

Macaulay Culkin is neither interviewed, nor really discussed. Seems like an odd thing to leave out.
posted by maxsparber at 10:52 AM on November 12, 2015 [9 favorites]

Pizza-themed rock is a demanding mistress.
posted by Sangermaine at 10:57 AM on November 12, 2015 [9 favorites]

The director, Chris Columbus, took the job just to escape working on Christmas Vacation, so he wouldn't have to work with legendary jerk-off Chevy Chase.
posted by dgaicun at 11:12 AM on November 12, 2015 [8 favorites]

Films get old. And, oddly, those who saw them years ago also age.
posted by Postroad at 11:17 AM on November 12, 2015

Nice link, you filthy animal.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 11:31 AM on November 12, 2015 [12 favorites]

Really, any mention of Home Alone is likely to have me using the "you filthy animal" bit.

Budding movie snob me hated this movie when it came out, but watching it again with my kid last xmas, I could see the appeal much better. Thanks for posting this.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 11:38 AM on November 12, 2015 [2 favorites]

Yeah I think I had budding movie snob problems then too. Looking back I missed out on plenty of good stuff that I was Too Advanced for. On the other hand my step mom did show this movie at home at least 20 times. So I dunno. I... don't want to watch it again.
posted by RustyBrooks at 11:40 AM on November 12, 2015 [1 favorite]

A classic take from Grantland: Did Kevin From Home Alone Grow Up to Be Jigsaw? A Deadly Serious Investigation
posted by Joey Buttafoucault at 11:46 AM on November 12, 2015 [4 favorites]

I'm blown away by how they got full use of the then-unused New Trier [West] High School.
posted by ZeusHumms at 11:48 AM on November 12, 2015

I grew up two or three suburbs north of Winnetka, and to this day my father will, at the least provocation, drive people past the Home Alone house. (He was visiting this weekend, and we were joking about it because it was in theaters again - the movie, that is, not the house.)

A slight blond classmate of mine actually got cast as a body double, too - the shot of the kid placing matchbox cars on the stairs is actually Ben's hands, not Macaulay's. Macaulay came to Ben's 10th birthday party at the batting cages, seemed desperately uncomfortable, and spent the whole time with the grownups. I felt bad for him.
posted by restless_nomad at 12:00 PM on November 12, 2015 [6 favorites]

Chris Columbus adds aspartame to every movie he directs. Oh, he wants his touch to be sweet and endearing, but no, it's fake sweet that leaves a bitter aftertaste. That's what he did for Home Alone, and that's why I can't take the movie. In the hands of a more skilled director, it probably would have flipped into being a classic for me. This is true of every movie he's touched.

Something is just not right about Chevy Chase. He has this legendary reputation for being a complete dick, yet much of what he touches turns to gold, perhaps sometimes because he's a dick. Look here - what is a classic holiday movie, Christmas Vacation, could have been poisoned by Columbus, but like a Twilight Zone talisman, Chevy scares him off and the movie is saved.

Is this somehow connected to the question about killing baby Hitler? If you went back in time and stopped Chevy Chase from being a dick would the world turn out for the worse? Who is Chevy Chase that he has these dark powers?
posted by Muddler at 12:03 PM on November 12, 2015 [11 favorites]

I've been contemplating showing my kids the first movie. I'm just a little afraid they're gonna booby-trap the house afterwards.

This is a great piece. Thanks for posting it!
posted by zarq at 12:04 PM on November 12, 2015

Home Alone came out when I was 9, and it was probably the first time I noticed something not especially remarkable get ridiculously popular. I liked it and all, but the world went completely bananas for it and to this day I'm not really sure why.

The next time that happened on a similar scale was Titanic, which also came out around Christmas. Coincidence, or just something to do while you're stuck at the mall and too old to spend two hours in line for Santa?
posted by Sys Rq at 12:07 PM on November 12, 2015 [1 favorite]

Daniel Stern: "Anywhere I go, I’m the Home Alone dude. In 2003, I went to visit troops in Iraq. I was at a base camp, and they wanted to take me into Baghdad, to a jewelry store that they’d secured. They said I could buy earrings for my wife. I was like, “What? All right.” So we go in these cars into Baghdad, and as I’m walking into the jewelry store, we get surrounded by kids going, “Marv! Marv!” Like 16 Iraqi kids in the middle of a war zone in Baghdad still recognized me from Home Alone. That movie is everywhere.

So cool.
posted by zarq at 12:10 PM on November 12, 2015 [4 favorites]

I love that when Chris Columbus complained about the star in his movie not "getting along" with him that he was given other great opportunities. It is amazing to be a man.
posted by amanda at 12:11 PM on November 12, 2015 [10 favorites]

I lived in Glencoe just north of Winnetka and every time one of our relatives or friends came to visit, they wanted to drive past that house. When we would drive past Hubbard Woods park, without telling them they would scream there's the ice place.

Fwiw, I like the movie more and more as I get older. I love slapstick and this does a good job of at least having a story around all the pratfalls.
posted by AugustWest at 12:17 PM on November 12, 2015

An oral history of how everyone's favorite over-privileged, self-absorbed, stupidly rich white family that stupidly left their murderous sociopathic son home in a neighborhood full of other wealthy families that were like "stay in our mansion-sized houses for Christmas week? Ummmm We're not Poors, thankyouverymuch" so they all decamped for the Hamptons or whatever while two cat burglars were like "I wanted one of them 13" TVs with the VCR built in but I guess murdering an 8 year old is pretty chill too" movie got made.
And in spite of that I still love this awful dickhead movie.
posted by Senor Cardgage at 12:28 PM on November 12, 2015 [14 favorites]

And in spite of that I still love this awful dickhead movie.

As I noted in the Jigsaw story from last year, one of my friends said "We're watching a snuff film, aren't we?" after the blowtorch scene, which only made it more hilarious to us but absolutely scandalized some grandmother in the audience.
posted by Etrigan at 12:33 PM on November 12, 2015 [1 favorite]

AugustWest I'd be more about the Risky Business house, which is supposed to be in your hood.
posted by Senor Cardgage at 12:37 PM on November 12, 2015

Films get old. And, oddly, those who saw them years ago also age.

Films get old only if they suck. What actually gets old is our seeming incapacity to enjoy and learn from old films.
posted by blucevalo at 12:37 PM on November 12, 2015

This article brought to mind a few things: 1) I want to watch the movie again--to really pay attention to the stunt work, which yeah is superb, and also because I really love Catherine O'Hara's performance. Between this and Beetlejuice, man, O'Hara was awesome.

2) I was nine or ten when this movie came out and I remember it was one of the few movies I saw in the theater more than once.

3) Daniel Stern seems like a genuinely cool guy.
posted by Maaik at 12:45 PM on November 12, 2015 [5 favorites]

When it comes to getting old, blucevalo, Postroad has us all beat. By decades. What he wrote up there, I took to mean when we age, we sometimes develop an appreciation for things we lacked when younger. Your mileage has obviously varied.
posted by y2karl at 12:46 PM on November 12, 2015 [1 favorite]

I like to watch this with my kids and then google around for other people gossiping about how terrible his whole family is. Seriously fuck Biff I mean Buzz. I get kind of a vicarious buzz seeing Kevin's family treat him like shit and then feeling bad for it after committing the ultimate transgression of failing to bring him to another god damn country.
posted by aydeejones at 12:56 PM on November 12, 2015 [1 favorite]

This means that "Bring me back something French!" has been a standard parting tradition in my circle for 25 years, too! Also me narrating out loud to myself as I brush my teeth.
posted by padraigin at 1:02 PM on November 12, 2015 [2 favorites]

It probably helps to mention that I was basically Kevin's age when it came out so I don't see him as a murderous sociopath etc. Just a misunderstood little punk with a narcissistic family, doomed to a life of petty conquests. I was still old enough to be jaded that he seemed to make fifty million bucks every time he screamed but in reality he got pretty well shafted for the first movie, like $100k IIRC
posted by aydeejones at 1:05 PM on November 12, 2015 [2 favorites]

My wife saw Home Alone for the first time while we were visiting my family for Christmas. I was 5 when it came out, and it's always been one of the "holiday movies" we'd watch at least once around Xmas, on TV or something, so it's nostalgic for me.

My wife however... never saw it as a child, or at all, and watching it as an adult was apparently singularly unpalatable. She was truly horrified that I enjoyed it.

(This also explains why one time when I described running through the airport full-tilt as "home alone-ing it", she had no idea what I meant. I thought anyone alive in 1990 knew that one.)
posted by nakedmolerats at 1:05 PM on November 12, 2015 [4 favorites]

Senor Cardgage: "AugustWest I'd be more about the Risky Business house, which is supposed to be in your hood."

I also got a few who wanted to see the Breakfast Club high school. (New Trier West)
posted by AugustWest at 1:12 PM on November 12, 2015 [2 favorites]

Postroad: "Films get old. And, oddly, those who saw them years ago also age."

One day it dawned on me when someone looked at one of my kids and said how old he had gotten that I too had aged. Old indeed.
posted by AugustWest at 1:14 PM on November 12, 2015

This is one of those movies that I'm not sure if I actually ever watched all the way through or if I was just so bombarded with commercials for it and clips from it that I might as well have seen it. I do remember my ex- getting into a huge fight with her mom over letting our son watch it during a weekend at grandmas.
posted by octothorpe at 1:48 PM on November 12, 2015

My wife however... never saw it as a child, or at all, and watching it as an adult was apparently singularly unpalatable. She was truly horrified that I enjoyed it.

When I was a kid everyone else had seen this movie a million times and talked about it a lot and I wasn't allowed to watch it because my dad thought it was appalling that anyone could find any part of the movie funny when the entire premise was that a child was forgotten. I think the idea still really, really bothers him.
posted by Mrs. Pterodactyl at 2:01 PM on November 12, 2015 [1 favorite]

It probably helps to mention that I was basically Kevin's age when it came out so I don't see him as a murderous sociopath

Understandable. I was close to the Olsen twins' age circa Full House, which initially kept me from realizing that Michelle Tanner was the spawn of Satan.
posted by imnotasquirrel at 2:17 PM on November 12, 2015

"...my dad thought it was appalling that anyone could find any part of the movie funny when the entire premise was that a child was forgotten. I think the idea still really, really bothers him."

As a parent now of a small child, I hesitate to watch this one again. Worse case scenario: I'd start having anxiety dreams that I would forget my kid like that. I totally understand your dad's point of view. I am super sensitive to kids in peril or kid mistreatment, at least significantly more than pre-kid.

On the other hand, I was also 9 when this movie came out and I know I've seen it multiple times. My younger brother and I also saw the NY sequel a few times. We might have even owned it on VHS.

Gah! Now I don't know if I want to watch it again or not!
posted by jillithd at 2:17 PM on November 12, 2015

Serendipity: I'm responsible for nineteen of the twenty top-grossing films of all time.

Bethany: Nineteen?

Serendipity: Yeah, the one about the kid, by himself in his house, burglars trying to get in and he fights them off? I had nothing to do with that one. Somebody sold their soul to Satan to get the grosses up on that piece of shit.
posted by ogooglebar at 2:28 PM on November 12, 2015 [9 favorites]

Culkin became this sensation so quickly because of this movie I always felt like I was in the minority at the time thinking he was a pretty poor actor in this. We are around the same age, so this wasn't coming from a place of knowledge on what good acting looks like, either. I mean, I was a kid that actually liked the TMNT movie and all kinds of other terrible crap. But it felt to me like the words coming out of his mouth don't come off as his own; he seemed like someone stiltedly reciting lines he had only just committed to memory and didn't really understand. He seemed like this quiet kid who had no interest in acting stuck in a movie where he is asked to play a personality that's totally alien to him. That's pretty harsh I guess. I did enjoy the cartoonish violence and slapstick of it as a kid. I guess I just didn't get how the movie got quite so big and how Culkin was seemingly such a huge reason for it.
posted by Hoopo at 3:09 PM on November 12, 2015 [1 favorite]

"...my dad thought it was appalling that anyone could find any part of the movie funny when the entire premise was that a child was forgotten. I think the idea still really, really bothers him."

For some reason I find this a funny reason to be so opposed to the movie, when there are like, thirty ways that the bad guys should get maimed or even killed that are played for laughs. This weirds me out as an adult - cartoony violence is one thing, but it's really weird that it's a live action movie going "crushed by a tool chest! Ha ha ha."

Granted I guess they do threaten to kill Kevin, but somehow they seem so inept that the adults are less threatening than the kid chucking paint cans at them!
posted by nakedmolerats at 3:18 PM on November 12, 2015

In the darkest timeline, Chris Columbus directs Home Alone with Chevy Chase playing the dad in his Community persona, where he plans and executes both the abandonment and home invasion to teach his son to be a man.
posted by zippy at 3:19 PM on November 12, 2015 [4 favorites]

Look whatcha did ya little jerk

man, fuck you uncle Frank, fuck you
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 4:18 PM on November 12, 2015 [5 favorites]

For some reason I find this a funny reason to be so opposed to the movie, when there are like, thirty ways that the bad guys should get maimed or even killed that are played for laughs. This weirds me out as an adult - cartoony violence is one thing, but it's really weird that it's a live action movie going "crushed by a tool chest! Ha ha ha."


I feel like there was a succession of "kid vs. bad guys feat. cartoonish violence" movies after Home Alone. Baby's Day Out? I saw that a few times as a kid, they showed it to us in school.
posted by atoxyl at 4:29 PM on November 12, 2015 [1 favorite]

I can't remember if I saw this movie when it was released, but I do remember the sequel being one part of a holiday trifecta of movies I absolutely had to see over winter break along with Muppet Christmas Carol and Disney's Aladdin. I don't think I've ever made as many trips to the movie theater in any given month since then.
posted by RonButNotStupid at 4:50 PM on November 12, 2015 [1 favorite]

man, fuck you uncle Frank, fuck you

He is the king of the cool jerks.
posted by nakedmolerats at 5:02 PM on November 12, 2015 [3 favorites]

The product placement pitch with Pepsi must have been interesting. "No, your soda won't be featured in the climax of the film, it'll make cousin Fuller piss himself at night instead!".
posted by dr_dank at 6:13 PM on November 12, 2015 [2 favorites]

Cullen was a bad actor yes. But this film to me is Christmas, in a way that only the Muppet Christmas Carol and Emmot Otter can equal.
posted by triage_lazarus at 6:15 PM on November 12, 2015 [1 favorite]

Clearly Kevin represents the bourgeoisie, with an unquestioned sense of entitlement to the wealth and property he is granted by virtue of his association with the ruling class (his parents). Kevin believes it's his duty to defend the status quo by violently crushing the proletariat (represented by Harry and Marv) who seek to seize the wealth on behalf of the people. His evident thrill in acting out this oppression belies his obliviousness to the structural forces that compel it; Kevin is merely performing on a small scale the violence that is built into the socioeconomic system itself. Furthermore, his vision of joining the ruling class is ultimately only an illusion: once the threat has been neutralized, the ruling class reasserts its power and Kevin unthinkingly returns to his subordinate role.
posted by dephlogisticated at 6:46 PM on November 12, 2015 [14 favorites]

Like Kevin could even pronounce bourgeoisie. He's what the French call...Les Incompetents.
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 7:51 PM on November 12, 2015 [10 favorites]

> I love that when Chris Columbus complained about the star in his movie not "getting along" with him that he was given other great opportunities. It is amazing to be a man.

You're not wrong. But in this case I hope it's because Chevy Chase's dickishness is immediately obvious to anyone who's ever met him, and that not getting along with him is a positive personality trait that Hughes wanted to reward.
posted by savetheclocktower at 10:04 AM on November 13, 2015

I liked how Freddie Hice went out of his way to get a Tom Cruise dig in: When Home Alone came around, there weren’t any stunt guys available who were the size of Joe Pesci. Everyone was gone making Days of Thunder. Remember that Tom Cruise deal?
posted by benbenson at 1:53 PM on November 13, 2015 [1 favorite]