Kevin Mcallister must have been an anti-social nerd.
I realize that this stance on Home Alone sounds harsh, but hear me out. As is the annual tradition, we were watching the 21 year old movie tonight when I noticed a trend in the movie that hadn't picked up on before. You see Kevin building all of his gadgets and traps and have him talking about making ornaments with the forbidden glue gun and his dads new fish hooks.
This all makes for fitting foreshadowing to the madness that follows in the second half of the movie, but it also shows his ingenuity in Macgayver-ing his schemes. The whole thing with the mannequins as a faux party to throw the set bandits off his scent? Inspired stuff, I wouldn't have thought about that now, let alone at eight years old. So his gearhead/crafty nerd side is firmly in place.
But here's the other thing - I don't think Kevin has any friends. Not once in the three day ordeal does he think to call a friend. I'm not saying I'm throwing a ripper the minute my family disappears (actually, I did do that in high school...once) but never in his folly did he think about calling a buddy? Sure, everybody in the immediate neighborhood was out but that doesn't mean Chicago was empty. Furthermore, are there no Jews in Chicago? Not everyone is tied down for the holiday. So no friends came over, not even the kid from across the street, the talky one whose fault it was anyway.
Poor, misunderstood Kevin Mcallister. No friends and a nerdy passion for building contraptions and booby traps. He endured his darkest hour, a Twilight Zone scenario that saw him unleashing his crafty talent to save his own life. The Looney Tunes action turned dark at the last minute, with Joe Pesci threatening to bite of Kevin's fingers. Yeah, it got kind of weird there as the Wet Bandits hit the end of their rope.
They never stood a chance against that adorable little nerd, though.
I realize that this stance on Home Alone sounds harsh, but hear me out. As is the annual tradition, we were watching the 21 year old movie tonight when I noticed a trend in the movie that hadn't picked up on before. You see Kevin building all of his gadgets and traps and have him talking about making ornaments with the forbidden glue gun and his dads new fish hooks.
This all makes for fitting foreshadowing to the madness that follows in the second half of the movie, but it also shows his ingenuity in Macgayver-ing his schemes. The whole thing with the mannequins as a faux party to throw the set bandits off his scent? Inspired stuff, I wouldn't have thought about that now, let alone at eight years old. So his gearhead/crafty nerd side is firmly in place.
But here's the other thing - I don't think Kevin has any friends. Not once in the three day ordeal does he think to call a friend. I'm not saying I'm throwing a ripper the minute my family disappears (actually, I did do that in high school...once) but never in his folly did he think about calling a buddy? Sure, everybody in the immediate neighborhood was out but that doesn't mean Chicago was empty. Furthermore, are there no Jews in Chicago? Not everyone is tied down for the holiday. So no friends came over, not even the kid from across the street, the talky one whose fault it was anyway.
Poor, misunderstood Kevin Mcallister. No friends and a nerdy passion for building contraptions and booby traps. He endured his darkest hour, a Twilight Zone scenario that saw him unleashing his crafty talent to save his own life. The Looney Tunes action turned dark at the last minute, with Joe Pesci threatening to bite of Kevin's fingers. Yeah, it got kind of weird there as the Wet Bandits hit the end of their rope.
They never stood a chance against that adorable little nerd, though.
