Review of The Grinch (2018) by Ivan J — 24 Nov 2018

As a tired and busy mom, especially around the holidays, I'm sure it will come as no surprise that this rendition of The Grinch is - by far - my absolute favorite. I'm surprised it is not getting much love here, but I guess any retelling of a classic will always be compared to it's original, and older audience members tend to remain strict loyalists to anything they saw as children.

That is only built up by our fun memories of childhood, and not so much by the quality comparison of the remake. For example: some here are calling the 2000 live-action version, with Jim Carrey, "amazing".

I'd guess that's the middle-generation; those who saw that version first. I like both the cartoon versions better, but then: I was a child of the 1980s. As one of those, I can see many ways in which quality of children's movies, just in general, has gone downhill as most kid's movies resort to sophomoric and base humor, which is not something I like my own kids to have to sit through, so I'll admit this is the very first Illumination movie I've ever brought my family to see, and that may be one reason I am as impressed as I am.

This version of The Grinch surpassed my expectations for it. My daughter wishes we lived in Who-Ville! She'd love a giant snow-slide connecting her from our front door to a magical valley, like that one, down below! I appreciate that this Grinch had many great lessons about character to teach: after stealing Christmas, the Grinch does not just slide right on down and land at the head of the Christmas table, for example.

Instead, he has to own up to what he did. It was awkward to watch him try, very hard, to explain his poor behavior; we could feel the shame and guilt he felt. I like that he had to apologize, first. This Grinch was very human; was affected by sad memories that made him jealous of other's happiness.

It was understandable, but not excusable. I like that this Grinch predicts typical childish greed from the Who-ville kids but instead he gets his mind blown by the generosity and maturity of Cindy Lou Who, but I also like that some of Cindy's friends do, in fact, display the greed levels about on par with the Grinch; wanting to kidnap Santa to steal all his toys! Great Christmas movie about the importance of family and friendship, and the first to really give us a backstory of the hurt and loneliness behind the Grinch's evil deeds, with the kindness of Who-ville melting that all away.