Review
Finally, after year upon year of offering up nothing but yuletide pap, somebody in Hollywood came up with the clever idea of making a Christmas movie over-the-hill, childless, unmarried Grinches can love … and, thankfully, Tim Allen isn’t anywhere to be found. Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus!
It’s “Lemony Snicket’s a Series of Unfortunate Events,” director Brad Silberling’s inspired adaptation of the wildly popular kids’ book series that ‘tis a hell of a lot more naughty than nice.
In the gothic, Tim Burton-meets- Charles Dickens universe Silberling and his design team has created, Jim Carrey is in his element as the sinister and waggish Count Olaf, distant uncle to a trio of orphaned siblings called the Baudelaires. The ghoulish-looking Olaf is a failed actor with designs on doing-in his young charges and making off with their large inheritance. It’s just the sort of over-the-top role that suits Carrey’s singular histrionics, but he isn’t alone in carrying the darkly humorous day.
Meryl Streep is splendiferous as the Baudelaire’s unstable Aunt Josephine, and the kids themselves are no slouches either – especially Emily Browning as the eldest child, 14-year-old Violet. Jude Law is here too – as the voice of narrator Lemony Snicket. (Rated PG for thematic elements, scary situations and brief language. Running time: 107 minutes)
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on December 17, 2004. Read the original PDF.