DailyView: Day 224, Movie 311

Merry Christmas continues at the DailyView with the next Christmas film on the list. It is the infamous 1996 Arnold Schwarzenegger/Sinbad film, Jingle All the Way.

What a figurative cartoon this film was.

Arnold played Howard Langston, a successful businessman who has been taking his wife Liz (Rita Wilson) and son Jamie (young Anakin himself, Jake Lloyd) for granted, missing important events like Jamie’s karate meet.

Howard wanted to make it up to his son so he wanted to get his son the hottest toy on the market, the Turboman action figure, the same toy Howard was supposed to have already gotten weeks before. On Christmas Eve, the chances of finding one of the wanted toys was nearly impossible.

As he is standing in line at the toy store, Howard meets Myron (Sinbad) a postal worker who was also desperate to find a Turboman figure for his own son. This led to a series of increasingly ridiculous situations that placed the pair of them into a Road Runner/Wile E. Coyote-esce conflict.

The film also featured a performance by the late Phil Hartman as Howard’s slimy neighbor Ted, who was looking for his opportunity to make a move on Liz. Hartman was always great, but he could not save this turkey.

This movie has some entertaining moments that are just truly stupid. You have to really stop thinking or hoping for depth in character or sensible plot points, and, if you do, it is possible to not be offended by Jingle All the Way…maybe.

If you look at it as a cartoon, this is dumb fun (well, fun might be a stretch). Arnold is totally playing an Saturday morning cartoon character, with facial expressions to match. Arnold has had better acting performances in his career, but Jingle All the Way has to be near the bottom of the barrell.

Oh, and poor Robert Conrad.

This one is bad. Really bad.