Game #12: The Holiday

"How Can You Not Have Chemistry with Jude Law?"

As we watched through "The Holiday," we invented different movies with similar premises that would have been more enjoyable to watch. Perhaps a buddy comedy, in which Cameron Diaz and Kate Winslet meet and help each other sort out their love lives. How about a movie in which Winslet and Diaz trade houses and fall in love with each other through a series of intimate scenes involving the others' possessions? Or even a movie that is just Kate Winslet and Jack Black's love story that's an hour shorter?

"The Holiday" had a good cast, a decent premise, Hans Zimmer doing the score, and a script that could be called "fine". The problem is, a movie that started with mediocre ingredients took every wrong turn during production, and eventually became a hoary treatise on love with unlikeable characters and an emotionally manipulative storyline. 

Luckily, all the elements that cause "The Holiday" to fail as a movie make it perfect fodder for a drinking game. We had the best time not enjoying this movie, and with our game's rules, so can you!

"The Drunk-All-Day": The Rules

We recycled the same drinks we used for the "Mean Girls" drinking game: vodka cranberries and red wine. I dare you to think of a better cocktail for a standard romcom. 

Tempting, but no.

Easy Mode
1. Drink for Title Drops. That's every time someone says "Holiday".
2. Drink for Daddy Issues. Remember, the character has to specifically mention "Dad".
3. Drink when they drink.
4. Drink when someone gets hurt. That's physical and emotional pain.
5. Drink for when a cultural difference is pointed out. Time differences count.

Medium Mode
All of the above rules apply. Also...
1. Drink whenever the dick makes the decisions. It's not the smart thing to do, or the right thing to do. But it feels so goddamn good.

Hard Mode
All of the above rules apply. Also...
1. Drink whenever someone says something cliched. Drink twice if the cliche doesn't have to do with love.

"Well, this is certainly a meet cute"...Define 'cute'.

The Players

The onscreen players for this game are Krissy (me), Shirley Whiskas, and The Bishop. We talked about the countries in which we felt most likely to find a lover.

Our off screen players are...

Flux: She can't resist the "will-they-won't-they" tension (Easy)
Paul: He identifies with Cameron Diaz (Medium)
Levi: He's just here for Jude Law (Medium)
Pooh Daddy: He would have knocked out a better score than Hans Zimmer's (Hard)

Girly drinks in hand, we sighed and prepared ourselves for what was to come.

Silly Stuff First

I'm going to start by talking about the stuff that was weirdly charming, or at least relatively harmless.

Eli Wallach's character is pretty charming. We considered him Kate Winslet's "real" opposite in this movie, as he paves the way for her character's emotional healing. Jack Black's just the lucky guy Winslet's heart leaps to after the healing process is done. In return, Winslet helps Wallach heal physically and walk onstage to accept an award for his services in film. What a wonderful side-plot; it even comes complete with a "getting in shape" montage!

"This is almost like 'Rocky'." -Levi

Imogen Heap shares the spotlight with Hans Zimmer in the movie's score, in keeping with the movie's "England is awesome" message. But some moments don't benefit from her wistfully sincere sound. For example, maybe Heap shouldn't accompany a love scene between two lovers who aren't on the same page about their relationship. At least not with a song as on-the-nose as "Just for Now."

"Most awkward sound choice ever." -The Bishop.

All of us slowly fell in love with Jack Black as the movie progressed. Funny, considering he only enters about 40 minutes in and has less than half an hour of combined screen time. 

"Wait, Jack Black plays piano?" -An uninformed Pooh Daddy

We enjoyed how easy it was to tell good guys from bad guys in this very straightforward world. Just look at Rufus Sewell. Doesn't he just look like a guy who would take your heart in his hands and stomp all over it? 

"He looks so stereotypically villainous." -Flux

Uhm...there's a dog! He's pretty cute!

Is he cute enough to warrent a two minute scene between he and Diaz? An utterly pointless scene where they make funny faces at each other?

Let's get to the meat of this article, the reason it is a chore to watch. Here's a hint: it ain't Jude Law.

She's just sad the dog's a better actress than her. (drink)!

It's Called Joy

I admit it: Cameron Diaz is not a horrible actress. She's had her moments; "Being John Malkovitch", "Shrek", "There's Something About Mary"...all of these movies managed to get some decent work out of her. But in all of these movies, she appeared to be giving a fuck. In "The Holiday", she is the only actor NOT trying, at all.

Diaz and Winslet are set up in the film to be two halves of a functioning person. One is unfeeling, unemotional, uptight and work focused. The other is over-emotional, sentimental, and at times a little pathetic. Through the course of the movie, Diaz must learn to let herself feel things, and Winslet must learn to stick up for herself and have self-respect. It's a concept that could have been pulled off better if the characters were given equal attention in the film.

Instead, Diaz's plot is brought into the forefront while Winslet's is shunted to the side. Winslet's romance doesn't even come to fruition until the last ten minutes of the movie. It's a shame, because Winslet is giving a passionate, committed performance, while Diaz looks like she'd rather be anywhere else. 

When Winslet and Diaz trade houses, Winslet spends a good five minutes marveling at the size of her new vacation home, the pool in the backyard, the hundreds of movies she has access to along with a wide-screen television. She is wildly ecstatic, she can't wait to sink her teeth into everything Los Angeles has to offer. Her joy is only dampened when her slut of an ex calls her for a favor. Then she shrivels. But even her shriveling has action behind it, has momentum. We feel for her sadness because we've seen her joy.

"Don't go there, honey. The souveniers aren't worth it." -The Bishop

The reason we don't feel that way about Diaz is because the movie sets her up to be an unfeeling shrew who through the power of love learns how to experience her own feelings. One of the first things we learn about her is that she can't cry. Then we learn that she's a workaholic. THEN we learn that she can't even find joy in a cottage in the English countryside. Upon arriving in England, she farts around for a day and nearly packs up and goes home. There is no excitement. She finds no happiness in anything. So when she finally does access her emotions, we aren't there with her. We spent two hours watching her try to cry for the sake of producing tears. We see the ending coming a mile away, and depending on how sentimental you are you either appreciate the paring down of emotions or loathe it for its convenience and simplicity. 

Because it's a plot device, honey.

Winslet's character was written to be morose, and she managed to bring joy to the role. Diaz's character was written to be self-sufficient and guarded, and she managed to become more depressing than one could have guessed. Just because the material is mediocre doesn't mean you can do anything less than your absolute best with your performance. Hell, Jude Law let himself look like an idiot for the camera. And we ate it up. 

This same actor played Hamlet on a Broadway stage.

You're a Bad Person

I'd like to talk for a moment about how Diaz's character behaves in this movie in regards to Jude Law. She is a tool.

When the two lovers meet, Law is smashed after a night at his favorite pub. After he explains his presence at Winslet's cottage (he crashes there when he's had a bit too much), Diaz asks him if he would like a drink.

Excuse me? The man is already stumbling down drunk and you want to get him even MORE liquored up?

THIS is what I mean by letting the dick make the decisions. Diaz sees a hot man, so she puts his feelings and problems aside in order to have sex with him.

It goes about as well as could be expected.

When they wake up in the morning, she assures him that she's not going to fall in love with him ("You're only an hour into the movie, honey," said Pooh Daddy), and then they proceed to have the best first date ever. At the end of this date, Diaz dumps Law. Then she changes her mind, finds out he has kids, and dumps him again.

Yeah! That's how WE reacted!

The kicker comes when Jude Law tells Diaz that he loves her. A misguided move, to be sure. But her stony silence and later wishy-washy monologuing ("I hate monologues in movies," expounded Shirley) didn't help things any. 

Then they had sex again. And she dumps him. Again.

...Why are we supposed to like her? Please, enlighten me.

But It's Not All Cameron's Fault

"Look!" cried Paul as Diaz and Law got cuddly. "They're having a real plot moment!"

"You keep saying that," countered Levi. "Then we listen and they aren't doing anything!"

Even though Law, Black and Winslet are all trying their best, the script isn't giving them much. This movie is way too long. The exposition portion wasn't over until about forty minutes into the movie. The only movies I let get away with that have hobbits as the main characters. 

Now THERE'S a love story.

The movie runs about two hours and fifteen minutes. It has no business being that long, especially since half the scenes amount to nothing more than padding. This isn't a complex story, even for a romantic comedy, and we felt the length. Hell, wrapping up all the plot threads took at least fifteen minutes. The only movies I allow to have fifteen minute long endings have hobbits as the main characters. 

You can just FEEL the passion in their eyes.

And it's frustrating, because you can tell the writer really loves movies. A lot of this movie is about dissecting the romantic comedy rather than actually living it. Winslet's character is told she should start acting like a "leading lady" instead of a "best friend". Diaz's subconscious reprimands her by narrating her life like it's a movie trailer. Jack Black takes Winslet on a date to the video store and sings her his favorite movie themes. The influence of film as a medium is palpable throughout this movie, and several homages were made to "The Holiday's" better predecessors. Unfortunately, all this does is remind us that we could be watching "His Girl Friday" instead of "The Holiday".

We kept waiting for the other shoe to drop. This movie needed some surprises. 

Oooh, Like Maybe...

We watched Eli Wallach make his way unsteadily up a small set of stairs to accept his award ("There's no reason to be no-handsing this shit," cautioned Flux; he wasn't using a banister). Suddenly Shirley piped up, "Is he going to die?"

He didn't. He accepted his award and then Black and Winslet kissed. It was magical.

Similarly, we found out twenty minutes earlier that Law is a widower and "both a father and mother" to his two little girls. Upon hearing this news, Levi leaned forward and whispered, "Did he kill her?"

No, of course not. Although, it's not specified how she died...maybe it was in a gruesome accident...maybe there was a lot of blood...

Wow. Sorry for taking such a dark turn. It's indicative of how much we needed something to throw us for a loop. Everything in this movie is laid out so prettily. That makes it a little less than honest. Good romantic comedies acknowledge the messiness of life. This movie shoves all that under the rug and tells us to listen to Christmas Carols. For two hours. Anyone would get tired of that.

I wonder if she'd lend us any of her stash...

The Result

After the movie, we talked about the countries that seemed LEAST conducive to a love affair. 

The drinking game itself only did half its job, just like the film. Here are some extra rules to take the night from mediocre to fuzzy.

Drink whenever Cameron Diaz tries to cry.

OR

Drink whenever Kate Winslet cries.


Drinking for both of these rules would be suicide, so which would you rather keep track of: one woman's struggle to break down her walls, or the other's constant quest to keep it all together? Either way, you'll be crying with them in the end.

Drink whenever Cameron Diaz talks about things being complicated.

This is her main excuse for not committing entirely to Jude Law. Sex makes things "complicated". What this doesn't explain is why she, believing this, has sex with him anyway.

Drink whenever Jack Black appears in a scene.

Like a Chansey in the Safari Zone, Jack Black makes the whole world seem better whenever he shows up. You can count the number of scenes he's in on one hand, but he makes the most of his time. He handles relationships like an adult, an oddity in romantic comedies of any sort, and he does it with style and grace. 

And with minimal boob-grazing.

Thanks for reading, everyone! The month of May is TV month! Some very special television shows are going to get some spanking new drinking games. We start next week with a romance of a different sort...

If by "romance" you mean "bloodbath" or "titty brigade".

Like what you see? Follow us on Facebook and Twitter, at For Your Inebriation and @KrissyPappau respectively. You'll get weekly updates, behind the scenes drunk talk, and other chatter!

For Your Inebriation is written by Krissy Pappau (Hollis Beck). Video footage is taken by Pooh Daddy (Vincent Graham) and edited by Seb (Amy Yourd). All "The Holiday" images are owned by Columbia Pictures and Sony Pictures.