The Most Chaotic Movie of 2024

While Christmas is already a month behind us, we still have a few Christmas movies to examine. As for every year, December breathes life into a few genres, one of which is, of course, Christmas movies! In 2024, we got such gems as Red One, and uhhhh... you get the point. One of the 'many' Christmas movies we were so gracefully 'gifted' this year was the masterpiece known as Nutcrackers. So without further adieu, let's open one last holiday gift a month later.

story time.

Of course, the following contains spoilers for "Nutcrackers" 2024. So snuggle up, get a glass of warm milk and let's read one more Christmas story.

Micheal Maxwell, a real estate developer from Chicago, is on the cusp of the largest deal of his career. Before he can exhibit the final presentation of his deal, he takes a road trip out to rural Ohio, he ends up in the town where his sister formerly lived before she died in a car crash along with her husband. Micheal is forced to care for the orphaned children, which is an arduous task. After the kids get into increasingly dangerous situations, they trick him into doing stupid things. After a couple offers to take two of the children off his hands (which he refuses to do because he does not want to separate them) the children decide that their best bet for adoption is the town benefactor, Al. Micheal plans to accomplish this by taking the kids to his Christmas party. When the day comes, as Micheal tries to butter up people at the party, the children drive a golf through some Christmas decorations, and into the swimming pool. Now that Michael's plan has fallen through, At this point, we finally find the namesake of the movie. Junior, one of the kids, claims to have written a superior version of the classic theater show Nutcracker with ballet. Somehow, Micheal suddenly wants to produce and direct the entire show and have an opening night at the town theater. On show night, the youngest of the bunch overhears Micheal talking with a social worker about how the kids are a "pain in the ass" and right before the curtains open, the kids run away and appear to escape on a train. Micheal cancels the show and begins to pack up, having lost hope. He walks outside of the theater, only to see the group performing the new and improved nutcrackers in the middle of the road, where Micheals's sister and the children's parents died in the aforementioned car crash. As he watches, a montage plays and Micheal has an out-of-body experience, finally realizing that he does love the kids. Then everyone is happy and the movie ends. Roll credits.

small bits of context!

• All the children are really siblings.
• This was Stiller's first lead role in a movie in six years.
• The movie was filmed outside of Cincinnati.
• It premiered at the Toronto Film Festival.

rating.

Okay. Now I could understand how this movie could sound cute and heartwarming, which if that is your cup of tea, I understand. But this movie tries to cater to way too many audiences. Parts of the movie try to appeal to kids. For example: a whole subplot of this movie is about one of the boy's love interests. I'll save you the details, but there is a whole scene where the boy approaches the girl and farts after the whole golf cart fiasco. Then you have Ben Stiller, renowned for his roles in Zoolander, Night at the Museum, Tropic Thunder, Meet the Parents and so much more. When trying to appeal to younger, older, and all audiences in between, this movie was stretched so thin that every aspect felt forced and made you physically cringe at some points. The entire movie feels like a compilation of cliches that all have been run dry. The big city businessman is out in the weeds, orphaned children, etc. To get to a final consensus on this perplexing movie, I did the unthinkable. I asked a few people for their thoughts. After writing this article on and off for about a month, I have concluded it seems like this was an excuse for these children to dance on the big screen, and to bring the bulk of the attention through a nostalgic name. Of course, I mean to cast no shade at the kids in this movie, they did just fine, but more at the plot that seemed like an afterthought to the whole dancing. At this point, I would have made a joke about how this resembles a Hallmark movie but the New York Times beat me to the punch. So to wrap it up, it's time to put a number on this movie, and kick off my first-ever official rating. Now, this movie isn't unwatchable, it's honestly hypnotic, it draws you in and you want to finish it because it is so chaotic and... awful. Now since there is a slightly coherent story, characters that I could see a tiny demographic forming some kind of connection with, and some incredibly mediocre jokes, I give this movie an lower than average 4.5 stars, out of possible stars for a perfect score.

Thanks for reading! Next article will probably be about Red One, continuing the Christmas spirit. If you even slightly enjoyed my work, consider subscribing, its free and shows your support so you will never miss another article we publish.