**** outta *****

4 outta 5

In the remake centric media landscape, surprisingly The Grinch Who Stole Christmas only has the fantastic 1960s Boris Karloff voiced animated original and the 2000s Jim Carrey starring live action version. By remake standards, it’s due for a redux even though the original has been running on TV for literally decades. The Grinch gives the story new coat of CGI paint for a fancy, and very funny, redo. It doesn’t improve upon the original animated classic but this is still a good story told well. If anything, it’s just somewhat unnecessary but the movie is so damn fun that it gets a pass.

The Grinch (Bendedict Cumberbatch) is living up high on a mountaintop with his dog Max, overlooking all of the Whos in Whoville who are excited for Christmas. The overjoyed Mister Bricklebaum (Kenan Thompson) says that Christmas this year has to be three times bigger by order of the Mayor (Angela Lansbury), something the Grinch flat out disbelieves. Also in Whoville is Donna Who (Rashida Jones) and her kid, Cindy-Lou Who (Cameron Seely) who is determined to capture Santa Claus. The Grinch can’t take it anymore so he decides to steal Christmas from the Whos by dressing up as Santa and taking their gifts, decorations, cookies, everything for Christmas, which sends him on a collision course with the precarious Cindy-Lou.

The way that Grinch is constantly tormented by Christmas early on is hilarious and consistently inventive. Probably one of the movie’s best scenes is when a gang of Whos chase after the Grinch singing “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen” as the tempo picks up menacingly. Also another great bit is when Grinch is grousing about hating Christmas from his mountaintop and by him flies a Who in a helicopter transporting a tree so gigantic it blocks out the sun. It’s as if the holiday spirt had specifically decided to torment him and his actions almost make a certain bit of twisted sense.

Cumberbatch isn’t trying to imitate Boris Karloff’s deep baritone performance from the animated special, instead Cumberbatch’s Grinch is a high pitched whiny know it all. It certainly doesn’t sound a lot Cumberbatch which shows his impressive ability to do accents and the emotional expressiveness of the animation for the Grinch excellent. This is one of the more in-depth looks at the Grinch as it gives him a wee bit of a backstory about him as a lonely kid at an orphanage while others were happy on Christmas. The best stuff is when he goes off on random tangents like when he epically, sadly plays “All By Myself” on an organ and Max the dog’s drumming keeps screwing it up.  The relationship he has with Max the Dog is a really fun, really weird master and pet dynamic as he’s pretty mean to Max but Max still wants to help.

Cindy-Lou Who is a bit more proactive in the story than in previous versions. In the original cartoon she’s basically a stand in for “wistful” and not much else. Cindy-Lou here is trying to catch Santa Claus which leads to her successfully ensnaring the Grinch in a trap. Sure, it’s sort of a lot of filler as Cindy-Lou and her friends come up with a plan to capture Santa but it is funny filler. Also it has one of the movie’s best lines when a kid asks what if Santa is holding a flashlight to see in the dark and Cindy-Lou snaps “When do you ever see pictures of Santa holding a flashlight?!” Jones as the mother is incredibly perky as she’s basically there to trade exposition with Cindy-Lou. Really funny is Kenan Thompson as the incredibly happy Who that constantly irritates the Grinch. While it’s fun to hear Angela Lansbury again she’s not in it a lot to stand out.

The movie is narrated by Pharrell Williams who delivers his narration with gusto but Karloff’s original cartoon narration is so iconic it’s impossible to measure up. What is truly bad is the new rap attempt by Tyler, the Creator to do a version of “You’re A Mean One, Mister Grinch.” It just completely misses the mark and they really should have used the original theme. Still, those are just small slights as the direction by Yarrow Cheney and Scott Mosier is zippy. There is a nifty visual of presents precariously balanced on top of each other as the Grinch steals Christmas and the whole bundle constantly threatens to tumble away. The movie is very episodic as mostly it’s a lot of one off scenes of the Grinch preparing for his night to raid Whoville. There are a lot of amusing little sequences like when Grinch fails rather spectacularly at trying find reindeer or when he trains his crew to avoid the temptation of presents and delicious Christmas cookies.

The Grinch is not a remake that was particularly needed but it’s a faithful and very fun adaptation. Happily, the Grinch being irritated with Christmas for almost the entire time keeps it hilarious. Even when he’s being nasty to cute Whoville residents, Hell, especially when he’s being nasty, The Grinch remains enjoyable to watch.