Deck the Halls parents guide

Deck the Halls Parent Guide

Overall C

The perfect, peaceful holiday season pictured by Steve Finch (Matthew Broderick) is altered forever when Buddy Hall (Danny DeVito) and his family move in across the street and start decking their house with an excessive number of Christmas lights. Viewers may also find their holiday spirit dampened because the movie has been adorned with unnecessary sexual innuendo and dysfunctional-family antics.

Release date November 21, 2006

Violence B-
Sexual Content C+
Profanity B-
Substance Use C+

Why is Deck the Halls rated PG? The MPAA rated Deck the Halls PG for some crude and suggestive humor, and for language.

Run Time: 93 minutes

Parent Movie Review

Christmas traditions are important to many people, but to Steve Finch (Matthew Broderick) they are the holiday season. The optometrist blames his obsession on his childhood full of frequent relocations as the family followed his military father. Now, as a grown man, he wants nothing short of a “Courier and Ives” experience each December to share with his wife Kelly (Kristin Davis), teen daughter Madison (Alia Shawkat) and son Carter (Dylan Blue).

Unfortunately, his perfect, snow-dusted, white picket fence neighborhood is about to change. Buddy Hall (Danny DeVito) and his family are moving in across the street, and the biggest item they are bringing with them is Buddy’s over-the-top personality.

A salesman extraordinaire, Buddy can convince anyone to buy anything—however he is easily pulled off track and has a hard time sticking with a job. The Halls have barely settled in when the latest distraction comes along in the form of an Internet website called My Earth (think Google Earth) that shows pictures of the planet from space. When Buddy’s twin teen daughters Ashley and Emily (Kelly and Sabrina Aldridge) point out the neighbor’s house and explain they can’t see their own, the determined Dad decides to upgrade his image… with as many Christmas lights as it will take to do the job.

And so the conflict begins, with one neighbor wanting to turn the street into a veritable Christmas carnival, while the other only wants some peace while quietly sipping hot cocoa and watching snowflakes drift to the ground. As the lights get brighter and the noise becomes louder, the capacity of both men to remain polite becomes stretched, and the spirit of the season soon vanishes.

Written at the maturity level of a ten-year-old, Deck the Halls walks the well-worn path of adults acting like children and children acting like, well… hookers. The Hall twins dress as if they are headed to a seedy street corner, while the Finch’s son, who appears to be about 12, takes the opportunity to ogle the new scenery. The girls quickly convert conservative Madison to their clothing choices—although a little of the bookish brunette does rubs off on the stereotyped bimbo blondes when she convinces them to try reading a book.

Other disappointments are a number of somewhat veiled sexual innuendos, the portrayal of a cross-dressing sheriff who wears pink thong panties and a scene in which the two fathers lust over three female dancing Santas—only to discover they have been drooling over their daughters. Nor does the irreverent act of dousing their eyeballs with baptismal water at the local church help to wash these script sins away.

Sadly, this film is just one more in a growing trend of Christmas movies depicting dysfunctional families and circus like antics. While many of these recent titles (including this one) try to wrap things up with a “warm fuzzy” moment at the end, it is small reward for having had to sift through 90 minutes of the proceeding packaging. Considering the classic cinematic offerings of yesteryear, parents may want to check twice before adding this holiday turkey to their list of celebration ideas.

Starring Matthew Broderick, Danny DeVito.. Running time: 93 minutes. Theatrical release November 21, 2006. Updated

Deck the Halls
Rating & Content Info

Why is Deck the Halls rated PG? Deck the Halls is rated PG by the MPAA for some crude and suggestive humor, and for language.

Although it’s rated for family audiences, parents may be surprised by the sexual humor and innuendo in this film. A cross-dressing sheriff (who wears women’s underwear under his uniform), scantily dressed teen girls, and remarks about male anatomy may seem out of place in a Christmas movie. The plotline is bedecked with slapstick violence such as falls, snowballs (an elderly lady is accidentally hit in the head) and other mishaps. An inebriated man, who is a secondary character, drinks from a bottle of beer on a residential street. Some mild profanity is included, and a man shouts a term of Christian deity, but then pretends he was about to sing a Christmas carol.

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Deck the Halls Parents' Guide

Can Christmas traditions sometimes become too demanding? Do you think people are expecting more or less from the holiday season? Why might we be disappointed with the outcome?

Home Video

The most recent home video release of Deck the Halls movie is November 6, 2007. Here are some details…

The DVD release of Deck the Halls is trimmed with audio commentaries by director John Whitesell and actor Danny DeVito, an interview with Dylan Blue (who plays Carter Finch in the movie), alternate and deleted scenes, outtakes and bloopers, as well as a peek behind the scenes (including set and lighting design plus the intricacies of shooting Christmas in July). The dual-sided disc offers both full frame and wide screen presentations, with audio tracks in Dolby Digital 5.1 (English, French and Spanish). Subtitles are available in English and Spanish.

Related home video titles:

Tried and true classic Christmas movies you may want to share with your family include: It’s a Wonderful Life, Miracle on 34th Street (1947) or the 1994 remake, and A Christmas Carol.