My parents like to hold it over my head that I once insisted on being taken to see "Santa Claus Conquers the Martians" many moons ago; they remember it as one of the many trying sacrifices they've had to make over the years. Ha! They don't know from suffering. It's painful to think about how many innocent Moms and Dads will be subjected to the excruiatingly awful "I'll Be Home For Christmas" because it stars Tiger Beat cover boy and ex-"Home Improvement" regular Jonathan Taylor Thomas.
Next to this, "Santa Claus Conquers the Martians" looks like a work of depth and brilliance.
Keeping his lousy post-"Lion King" cinematic track record up -- his other bombs include "Man of the House" and last year's "Wild America" -- Taylor smirks and snaps his way through the role of Jake Wilkinson, a student at a California college where everyone looks 15 and behaves as if he or she is still in junior high. After his girlfriend Allie (Jessica Biel) refuses to spend the holidays with him on the beach, Jake reconsiders the offer from his father (Gary Cole) to return home to New York. As an incentive, Dad offers a 1957 Porsche.
Unfortunately, Jake has crossed some vengeful jocks who glue him into a Santa suit and strand him in the desert. Supposed hilarity ensues as the smart-mouthed St. Nick tries to scam his way across the country while struggling to catch up with Allie, who's hitched a ride home with a would-be Romeo named Eddie (Adam Lavorgna).
Humor is hard to come by in "Home," unless your ribs are tickled by gags about flatulent dogs or crazed Tom Jones fans, and anyone looking for a bit of early seasonal cheer will find instead a few gross caricatures of senior-citizens, just enough sexual innuendo to make pre-teens and their parents blush and a host of hollow, loud performances of the sort normally found only in TV commercials. Thomas strides from scene to scene with that annoying air of superiority that finally sealed Macaulay Culkin's cinematic fate. Don't believe the hype, child; you're not all that.
Vapid, sloppily made and utterly without merit, "I'll Be Home For Christmas" qualifies as ho-ho-horrible.
James Sanford
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