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Four Christmases
New Line Cinema (Warner Bros. Pictures)

Four Christmases reviews
Critic Score
Metascore: 41 Metascore out of 100
User Score  
4.4 out of 10
based on 27 reviews
Read critic reviews
How did we calculate this?
based on 17 votes
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MPAA RATING: PG-13 for some sexual humor and language

Starring Vince Vaughn, Reese Witherspoon, Robert Duvall, Jon Favreau, Mary Steenburgen, Dwight Yoakam, Tim McGraw, Kristin Chenoweth, Jon Voight, and Sissy Spacek

No one enjoys the holidays more than Brad and Kate. Every December 25th, this happily unmarried, upscale San Francisco couple embark on a holiday tradition they have shared every year since they met—ditching their crazy families for a relaxing, fun-filled vacation in some sunny exotic locale. But not this year. Shorts and sunglasses packed, Brad and Kate are trapped at the San Francisco airport by a fogbank that cancels every outbound flight. Worse yet, they are caught on camera by a local news crew, revealing their whereabouts to the whole city…and to their families. With no escape and no excuses, they are now expected home by Brad’s father. And Kate’s mother. And Brad’s mother. And Kate’s father. Four Christmases in one day. (New Line Cinema)


GENRE(S): Comedy  
WRITTEN BY: Matt R. Allen
Caleb Wilson
Jon Lucas
Scott Moore
 
DIRECTED BY: Seth Gordon  
RELEASE DATE: Theatrical: November 26, 2008 
RUNNING TIME: 82 minutes, Color 
ORIGIN: USA | Germany 

What The Critics Said

All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...

88
Baltimore Sun Chris Kaltenbach
Four Christmases works because of some genuinely funny setups, a pace that never dwells on one gag (or even one family) too long and a careful mix of slapstick and bawdy humor. But mostly, the film works because of the astonishing acting talent the filmmakers brought together to make it.
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75
Charlotte Observer Lawrence Toppman
Vaughn delivers every line with his usual deadpan glibness, which suits the part. But I smiled as I watched the big-bellied, multi-chinned actor connecting with the porcelain, model-thin Witherspoon.
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70
The New York Times A.O. Scott
Refreshingly tart and lean, forgoing the usual schmaltz and syrup.
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70
Salon.com Stephanie Zacharek
Gordon's best not-so-secret weapons, though, are his two stars: Vaughn and Witherspoon are an inspired pairing, not least because they're such a mismatched set of salt-and-pepper shakers.
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67
Entertainment Weekly Owen Gleiberman
Crassly enjoyable.
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67
Portland Oregonian M. E. Russell
It's pleasantly funny, and occasionally laugh-out-loud funny, from start to finish, even when it's staging broad, easy gags about baby barf and fat kids.
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50
Washington Post Dan Zak
The only laughs come from Vaughn, a master of ingratiation. Witherspoon is no Roz Russell or Lucille Ball. But she fills space nicely.
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50
Chicago Reader J.R. Jones
This is marginally better than most, with a few offbeat comic ideas, a reliably droll performance from Vaughn, and, as the parents, four watchable old troupers in search of a fat paycheck.
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50
ReelViews James Berardinelli
Four Christmases is waste of time and a disappointment, but it's also relatively painless.
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50
USA Today Claudia Puig
The film has its funny moments, but they are too few to make the holiday excursion worthwhile.
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50
TV Guide Cammila Albertson
It's well acted and it's entertaining -- and who can resist a movie where Vince Vaughn and Jon Favreau are brothers, and Robert Duvall is their dad?
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50
Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert
We got two gold-record singers and they don't sing? So? We got five Oscar-winning actors, and they don't need to act much.
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42
Seattle Post-Intelligencer Sean Axmaker
Neither clever nor heartwarming, Four Christmases is the coal in the stocking of holiday movies.
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42
The Onion (A.V. Club) Scott Tobias
The result is two bad movies in one: a gimmicky romantic comedy, and one of those seasonal headaches that submits loud family dysfunction as a vehicle for Christmas cheer.
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40
Variety Todd McCarthy
Oddly misanthropic, occasionally amusing but thoroughly cheerless holiday attraction that is in no way a family film.
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40
New York Daily News Joe Neumaier
Like the last gift buried under singing Billy Bass fish, dancing Coke cans, joke books and mounds of wrapping paper, there's a glimmer of fun in Four Christmases that almost gets vacuumed up with the tinsel.
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40
Film Threat Rick Kisonak
To put it in the best light possible, I recommend thinking of Four Christmases not so much as a really short movie but as a very special holiday episode of a sitcom.
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38
Philadelphia Inquirer Carrie Rickey
A generic oven-stuffer that wants to be a stocking-stuffer, is a turkey, despite the foil wrapping and some artfully deployed tinsel.
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38
Boston Globe Ty Burr
Four Christmases is essentially "Meet the Parents" quadrupled.
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30
The Hollywood Reporter Kirk Honeycutt
Bad enough to create one of the most joyless Christmas movies ever, but then to go for an unearned feel-good ending adds insult to injury.
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30
Austin Chronicle Steve Davis
This year's entry in this lowly subgenre is Four Christmases, a D-list comedy with A-list actors.
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30
NPR Bob Mondello
Alas, there's scarcely a moment of ingenuity or surprise in this tale of the supremely smug, unmarried-but-made-for-each-other Brad and Kate.
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25
San Francisco Chronicle Ruthe Stein
This is a movie of excesses that doesn't know when to settle down. It aims to be a slapstick comedy, a romantic comedy and a plain old romance but falls short of each goal.
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25
Miami Herald Rene Rodriguez
Four Christmases is sour to the point of curdling, a satirical look at the holidays a la "Bad Santa" that does exactly what that film avoided: come off as both off-puttingly misanthropic and gloppily sentimental.
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25
Chicago Tribune Michael Phillips
As Vaughn's therapist mother, Sissy Spacek comes off best. But she's a rare bird of whom it truly can be said: She's always good. No matter how grim the material.
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12
New York Post Kyle Smith
The movie boasts five Oscar winners. That figure exceeds by five the number of times I laughed at this cheap collection of icky jokes.
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10
Village Voice Robert Wilonsky
The movie doesn't offer a single surprise within its scant 82 minutes, which feel like at least twice that.
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What Our Users Said

Vote Now!The average user rating for this movie is 4.4 (out of 10) based on 17 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

Debbie M. gave it a4:
This movie seemed like it would be cute for adults but there is a lot of adult sexual scenes and content. I had my 13 and 12 year old with me and we had to leave the movie about 50 min. into it as it was way too inappropriate. And that was after letting about 4-5 sexual comments, etc. slide. Their is also a Santa spoiler so parents beware on this one. It's sad to me that this is what the movie industry feels is appropriate for 13 year olds.

Bill C. gave it a7:
C'mon , if you hate Vince Vaughn type of humor, than stay away. It's funny enough and packed with faces you'll recognise. Most of the humor is targeting the fact that we all have relatives we wish we could forget. The film was done for the jokes.Enjoy it for what it is because it as good if not better than most of what's out there.

Hans C. gave it a0:
Amazing that Christmas fare could have sunk this low. Better to stay home and watch a Christmas film from 50 years ago, rented from Netflix.

Lyle S. gave it a6:
I'm putting my two cents in because the score really is far from the truth. This is a decent movie and most of the people in the theatre enjoyed it. It's definitely not a must see, but it's painless and good for a few laughs. As long as you don't try and think too hard, this movie will entertain you and make you feel like it was 1.5 hours well spent.

Erv G. gave it a9:
It was a very funny movie!!! The had a blast watching it and my girlfriend enjoy it too. Vince Vaughn steal the show!!! Some very funny familiar situations.

ND gave it a2:
Took my mom to it, she was excited about it, but not even she could get over how horribly disastrous this movie was. It was painful to watch the eye-rolling humor followed by quasi serious scenes of witherspoon and vaughn trying to act out life lessons learned. Terrible film.

Thad J. gave it a10:
I don't know about the critics, but I laughed pretty hard.

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