FILM FOCUS: HOME FOR THE HOLIDAYS, PART II

Welcome to Part Two of a two-part examination of the Greatest Thanksgiving Movie Evah, Home for the Holidays.  Along with all of my previous praise I'd be remiss if I didn't acknowledge how well the movie represents the holiday itself.  The majority of the film takes place on Thanksgiving Day and you get a parade scene, you get football (both on TV and the front yard variety) and lots and lots of food.  Two turkeys, one fat and one lean (trope!), sweet potatoes stuffed in orange peels with cherries on top, stuffing, pumpkin pie, eggnog and leftovers.  It feels like the kind of Thanksgiving I had growing up (both the food and the functioning-dysfunctional family part).

The secret ingredient is love.  And paprika.

The kids in my family always got chocolate advent calendars on Thanksgiving from first my great-grandmother and later my grandmother, marking the official kick-off of the Christmas season. Being the Christmas fanatic that I am, I’ve always appreciated the Christmas creep that crops up throughout the movie, very small touches that remind you, as in life, that Christmas is right around the corner.  There are lights and decorations glimpsed in people’s yards, Christmas decorations seen tucked away in the basement during one scene, and storefronts and the airport are seen already decked out the day after Thanksgiving.  These small touches root the movie even further in reality and always make me wistful that a sequel, Home for Christmas, doesn’t exist.

Christmas is right behind you. And a little to the left.

It gives nothing away to say that the movies ends with a beautiful montage, one of my favorites scenes in all of film.  It captures earlier alluded to moments of joy for each of the characters, during which none of family members had a camera or managed to capture on film and yet represent some of their happiest memories.  All of the characters are given their due, shown at their best and brightest: Tommy at his wedding on the beach, Claudia snorkeling with her daughter, even Joanne and her husband, younger and I like to think less judgey, just goofing off together.  Each scene is a moment when maybe not all that much happens save people loving one another and life in general.

The very thought of you...

It’s powerful stuff and it gets me every time (and I’ve seen this movie a lot).  It doesn’t help that it’s set to Nat King Cole singing “The Very Thought of You,” as Nat King Cole was basically the soundtrack of my own family growing up.  It’s the kind of montage that makes you wish life was nothing but just a series of happy moments set to music, but Home for the Holidays isn’t afraid to fill in the other moments as well, the darker and unhappier ones.

I’ll conclude by saying that while watching the movie this year Nick and I ended up having to pause it halfway through to have an argument, spurred by something I said which was in turn inspired by something that happened on screen (and not the aforementioned comparison to Joanne).  I won’t go into details and rest assured we made peace but it struck me that that’s how good and true this movie is: just watching it brought out our own real-life family issues!  It has both the power to ignite arguments and sooth the soul.  When I first moved to New York and spent my first couple of Thanksgivings away from my family I watched Home for the Holidays over and over again.  It was like spending time with my own family, like escaping into the past, goods times, bad times and all of the bittersweet in-between.  

The very thought of you, my love

HACKY THANKSGIVING

Ruby

Season 3 (2010)

No, that’s not a typo in the title.  Ruby Gettinger, the eponymous star of the show, just has her own unique vocabulary, substituting “hacky” for “happy,” “helicopter” for “Hell” and “Christmas doctor” for gynecologist (I don't get that last one either).

Ruby is an under-seen gem (see what I did there?!) of a reality TV show that lasted a few seasons on the Style network.  The premise is absurdly simple: an obese woman in Savannah tries to lose weight.  Oh yeah, and she sorta kinda has childhood amnesia (something that’s frustratingly never resolved).  Once I started watching I was quickly sucked in and it became an obsessive favorite.  Ruby herself is extremely likeable, as is her supporting “cast,” mostly a coterie of painfully closeted Southern gay men.  Apparently we gay men are inexplicably drawn to Ruby like moths to a flame.

This Thanksgiving episode is sadly the only holiday offering from the show’s semi-brief run, but luckily it’s a good one.  It pretty much sticks to the Ruby formula in that not very much happens but somehow it all ends up being quite interesting.  Ruby demands that her friends and family produce two Thanksgiving dinners this year, a diet-friendly one and their traditional Southern calorie-clogger (including a deep-fried turkey).  She invites her trainers to the meal, everyone plays football, cooks, says grace, and eats. 

These mundane activities are made interesting by Ruby herself, a weird mix of childlike enthusiasm and emotionally damaged (and demanding) adult.  For example, she insists on sticking little signs into all of the food that labels it “healthy” or “fat,” apparently in an attempt to guilt everyone who is eating the delicious fatness in front of her.  She bans pumpkin pie from the house, for as a child she would eat an entire pie in a single day.  She also tries to introduce her guests to “gentle eating,” a process in which you chew each bite twenty times in silence and aren't allowed to drink.  It doesn’t go over so well.

Underneath the quirkiness of both Ruby the real-life person and Ruby the show there is a compelling emotional core.  When Ruby’s (horrible) ex-boyfriend Denny breaks down in tears during grace, remembering his recently deceased (and also obese) brother, it’s a very raw moment.  In an equally emotional scene, to avoid temptation Ruby and her friends later take their leftovers to a women’s shelter and share stories of addiction and recovery with the residents.

Similarly moving in an entirely different way is Ruby’s dismay at the end-of-episode weigh-in.  It’s revealed she’s gained weight thanks to all of her turkey day snacking seen throughout the episode (and, as she's just recently admitted, she was secretly feasting on fast food off-camera).  It’s a depressing moment, as you empathize with Ruby despite her faults.  At the end of the day she’s just terribly human.

Recurring Themes: Even reality shows aren’t immune to TV tropes, as evidenced by the Healthy Menu seen in this episode.

The Healthy Menu: Turkey, Stuffing, Brussels Sprouts, Roasted Vegetables Fat-Free Brownies & lots and lots of I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter

The Fatty Menu: Deep-Fried Turkey, Mashed Potatoes, Sweet Potato Casserole, Collared Greens & Corn Pudding

Thanksgiving Quotient: 4

See It, Skip It, Own It?

Three seasons of Ruby are now up on Netflix instant so start with this Thanksgiving episode and then watch the rest of the show— you’ll find yourself hooked!