The Relevance of Jingle All the Way (1996), But Not Jingle All the Way 2 (2014)

Christmas is the time of year for family, friends, and the thought of giving something nice to the ones who you love.  It is also a time of year for rampant commercialism and angry customers in the retail locations that normally seem semi-friendly.  The amount of money that people spend during the holidays is, on average, unmatched at any other time of year.  Travel, gifts, and food take up a lot of money at this time of year.  Money rules the holiday season, starting with Thanksgiving and Black Friday in the USA and ending with Christmas and Boxing Day in Canada.

One such movie that encapsulates the idea of holiday commercialization is Jingle All the Way.  You might be thinking that this is a throwaway family Christmas film that was part of Arnold Schwarzenegger’s attempt to appeal to all ages.  It might seem that way on the surface.  I mean, the movie is about Schwarzenegger trying to get a toy for his son.  But the movie is oh so much more than that.  In today’s day and age, nearly 20 years after its original release, Jingle All the Way manages to be a better representation of the consumer mindset than nearly any other film.

Jingle All the Way takes place on Christmas Eve.  Arnold Schwarzenegger plays Howard Langston, a working father who doesn’t pay quite enough attention to his family.  When he realizes that he hasn’t yet gotten his son Jamie (Jake Lloyd) the Turbo Man doll that he wants, Howard goes on a citywide quest to find the action figure.  He goes to stores, malls, warehouses, and a parade all in an attempt to get the one toy that his son wanted for Christmas.  There was violence and mayhem through the entire day.

Throughout the majority of Jingle All the Way, Howard is battling against a man named Myron Larabee (Sinbad) to get the Turbo Man doll.  The extreme lengths that this battle goes to might seem rather heightened to the normal person.  Myron hits Howard with a mail bag.  They tear out phone cords.  Howard trips Myron with a remote control car.  They even end up in costumes fighting with each other at the parade, for all the viewers to see.  The two fight almost the whole movie, making the obtaining of the toy seem like a life or death situation.  This might seem over-the-top for most shoppers, but a lot of similarities can be seen in the stories we hear about Black Friday every year.

Black Friday is the day after Thanksgiving in the United States of America.  It is the day in which people change their focus to the Christmas holidays.  Retailers have made sure to capitalize on the day after Thanksgiving by offering people cheaper products and limited quantities.  The deals manage to entice more people to go to the store and purchase goods.  Stories come out year after year describing the frenzy that goes on during the Black Friday sales.  Injuries and even death have been reported as a result of people fighting over cheaper products.  In 2008, a Walmart worker was trampled when customers flooded into the store for discounted items.  That same year, two people were shot to death at a Toys ‘R Us.  This makes the Jingle All the Way altercations seem perfectly reasonable.

What makes Jingle All the Way so great is that it is cartoonishly accurate to what these stories of Black Friday tell us.  The extremes that the main character goes to in order to get his son the Turbo Man doll don’t seem so extreme when placed side by side with these seemingly real stories.  The movie depicts the insanity through the battle of the two main characters, as well as the general hysteria of the entire Turbo Man situation.  The stores that both characters go to depict situations that the real stories are about.  The first store has the doors open and people running into the store, trampling an employee.  That is the 2008 story depicted in a movie more than a decade before.  There is a scene in a store that involves all of the customers fighting over bouncy balls, much in the same way that people at Walmart fight over the newest in electronics, including the use of pepper spray or mace in order to get the toys.  The movie depicted these things before the stories were widespread through the internet.

Yet, in 2014, when WWE studios decided to produce Jingle All the Way 2, they left out all of the good social commentary that keeps the original as relevant as it is.  Larry (Larry the Cable Guy) is a divorced country guy living in a trailer.  Sometimes he gets to hang out with his daughter Noel (Kennedy Clements).  Other times she’s with her mom Trish (Kirsten Robek) and stepfather Victor (Brian Stepanek).  Larry is jealous of Victor’s wealth and ability to provide the perfect Christmas for Noel, while Victor is jealous that Larry is Noel’s father.  These jealousies lead to a battle over who can make a better Christmas for Noel.  Larry finds out that Noel wants a Harrison Talking Bear for Christmas.  Victor finds out what Larry knows and buys up all of the Harrison Talking Bears before Larry can get one.  And that’s about it.

There is very little social commentary about how everyone is fighting to get one of the toys in this sequel.  Instead, it is more about two fathers trying to one up each other and make a memorable holiday.  Though still semi-entertaining, it lacks the bite that the original had in regards to commercialization and the increasingly violent Black Friday type sales (though that may have been unintentional in the original).  There is only one scene that involves a mass of people trying to get at one toy, and that scene only involves them waiting in line then rushing to the shelf.  There are no altercations along the way.  This is a very safe imagining of these types of situations, and a massively toned down version of the Jingle All the Way franchise.

Perhaps it is an unintentionally relevant and scathing movie, but Jingle All the Way manages to show its viewers the problems of holiday shopping mania in a cartoonish, joking way.  It is more relevant than ever.  The second movie in the franchise shies away from this relevance to instead only focus on the farce.  That doesn’t take away from how much the first movie speaks to our culture.  Jingle All the Way is an unexpected Christmas classic and deserves more respect than it garners.

Now let’s get some notes into this post:

• The director of Jingle All the Way 2 was Alex Zamm.  That same director also directed Beverly Hills Chihuahua 2.
• Arnold Schwarzenegger was featured twice in the Sunday “Bad” Movies before this week.  Those movies were Hercules in New York and Batman & Robin.
• Two actors featured in New Year’s Eve were in Jingle All the Way.  Their names were James Belushi and Yeardley Smith.
• Danny Woodburn appeared in Jingle All the Way.  He was also in 30 Nights of Paranormal Activity with the Devil Inside the Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.
• Jingle All the Way 2 featured Eric Brecker, who was also in Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever.
• Jeff Gulka, from Stan Helsing, was also in Jingle All the Way 2.
• And last but not least, Jingle All the Way 2’s Brian Stepanek was also in Beverly Hills Chihuahua 2.
• Other WWE movies that I’ve covered that come to mind are The Marine, The Marine 2, The Marine 3: Homefront, and The Marine 4: Moving Target.
• Have you seen Jingle All the Way?  Do you think it is as relevant as I think?  Have you seen the sequel?  Is it weird that Larry the Cable Guy usually plays characters named Larry?  You can talk about these movies or this post in the comments below.
• You can also use the comments section to suggest movies to me.  I’m always looking for more movies to watch as a part of the Sunday “Bad” Movies.  If not there, find me on Twitter and tell me what movies I should watch.
• Next week, I will be watching 200 Cigarettes.  I have no idea what it is.  All I know is that it takes place on New Year’s Eve.  That’s why I’m going to watch it.  And it isn’t a popular movie.  So, yeah.  See you next week for 200 Cigarettes.