A Bad Moms Christmas may be considered somewhat of a disappointment for people like myself who enjoyed the original. This holiday sequel only contains about half the laughs and can be occasionally uneven.
Mila Kunis, Kristen Bell, and Kathryn Hahn are all back as the Bad Moms and this time around they have to deal with the most hectic time of the year for moms: Christmas. Kunis’ character is so stressed and obsessed with making her Christmas absolutely perfect and her desire for perfection goes into overdrive when her mother (Christine Baranski) comes into town for the holiday season. Baranski’s character is very much a Type A personality who criticizes everything Kunis does over the holidays and is always spoiling her grandchildren.
Bell and Hahn don’t fare any better as their moms (Cheryl Hines and Susan Sarandon) also join the festivities. Hines is mother to Bell and Sarandon to Hahn). Hines is such a clingy woman at all times that she makes Norman Bates’ mother look sane by comparison. As for Sarandon, she’s a gambling addict who’s a bit of wild child and fans of Thelma & Louise might notice similarities between the two. I just put both Psycho and Thelma & Louise in the same review as A Bad Moms Christmas. Let that sink in for a moment.
The rest of the movie is a series of mishaps and predicaments that are cookie cutter: Hahn’s character falls for another man and so does Sarandon; Kunis and Baranski fight constantly over the lifestyles they both lead and how it affects each other’s Christmases; and did I mention already that Hines is very much clingy to the point that she moves in next door to Bell?
These ladies only get a handful of moments where they can bust loose but overall they feel trapped by a script that is mostly lazy and uninspired and is totally predictable just like a lot of Christmas schlock. Not even the talents of Baranski, Hines or even Sarandon are excused of the same trappings as their characters are nothing more than just caricatures of a movie like this.
It isn’t the lump of coal we normally expect from this genre but I don’t think we’ll be getting A Bad Moms Easter or A Bad Moms Halloween anytime soon.
Grade: C
(Rated R for crude sexual content and language throughout, and some drug use.)
