What’s the worst Christmas movie of all time? According to IMDB, it’s Kirk Cameron’s “Saving Christmas,” which scores a 1.6 out of 10 on the site. Congratulations, Mike Seaver: When it comes to being the worst, you’re the absolute best.
Kirk Cameron’s Christian revisionist flick Saving Christmas is among the worst-reviewed movies on IMDB, where it ranks dead last on the site’s Bottom 100 list. Which would therefore make it a power bottom.
Saving Christmas, with its tagline “Put the ‘Christ’ back in ‘Christmas,’ rates a ghastly 1.6 out of 10 stars on the site. Keep in mind, of course, that a low rating on IMBD–which is largely user-driven–is not the same thing as a low rating on Rotten Tomatoes, which is all about collecting critics’ reviews.
Except it isn’t faring too well over there, either. At press time, Saving Christmas scored a 0% on the site’s infamous Tomatometer.
Of the twelve (12) reviews it’s collected since SC‘s November 14th release, not a single one has been positive. Here’s a sample:
Penny Walker, of the Arizona Republic, says “How do you prove a horse is an animal? Because I like Sweden. That’s the style of absurd logic that happens in “Kirk Cameron’s Saving Christmas.”
Peter Sobczynski, writing for RogerEbert.com, declares it’s “perhaps the only Christmas movie I can think of, especially of the religious-themed variety, that seems to flat-out endorse materialism, greed and outright gluttony.”
Kimberly Jones, film critic for the Austin Chronicle, writes “As a movie, Saving Christmas is not good. But as a teaching aid for congregants about having their fruitcake and eating it, too? Sure, why not. Go nuts, guys.”
And Bill Zwecker, of the Chicago Sun-Times, sums up the problem even Evangelical Christians seem to have with Cameron’s Christmas craziness, saying the following: “This clumsy film is really more like a home movie, set in Cameron’s own house, and cast with his family members and friends….[It] may be one of the least artful holiday films ever made. Even devout born-again Christians will find this hard to stomach.”
And, apparently, they do. As Biblical scholar Katie Hoyt McNabb notes, since many Christmas traditions were pagan to begin with, Christians shouldn’t feel threatened by any perceived attacks on the holiday.
There is nothing about Christmas in the Bible because it wasn’t celebrated while the Bible was written….Christians brought forth all of the things that made them happy and joyful when they decided to celebrate the event of Jesus’ birth. I don’t know why we as Christians feel that those traditions are being threatened.
Which sounds like an invitation for people of all faiths, including Christianity, to continue to heap ridicule on the movie, Mystery Science Theater-style. Saving Christmas is playing in a shrinking number of cities for a very limited time, so check the showtimes, load up your flask, and have a holly jolly time throwing one-liners at the screen.
