No amount of seasonal spirit could inject any ho-ho-ho into this festive turkey. Adapted from John Grisham's novel Skipping Christmas, this is a soulless tale that raises so few laughs, it barely justifies its comedy label. Tim Allen and Jamie Lee Curtis play the Kranks, a Chicago couple who incur the wrath of their local community when they decide to forgo Christmas and its associated trappings in favour of a luxury cruise. Poorly scripted and lazily directed, the film stamps all over individual thought and action, and instead celebrates herd mentality and excessive consumerism, unfairly painting its two lead characters as selfish villains. As the star of The Santa Clause movies, Allen is obviously used to yuletide nonsense, but even he flounders when faced with such unfunny material. The real tragedy here is Curtis, however, who totally wastes her ample comic talents on slapstick and shameful mugging.

When their only daughter Blair leaves the family nest, Luther and Nora Krank decide to book an island cruise to beat the yuletide blues and just skip the holidays. But their decision to boycott tradition has the whole neighborhood in an uproar, and when Blair calls on Christmas Eve to announce a surprise visit with her new fiancée, the Kranks have just twelve hours to perform a miracle and pull themselves and their neighbors together to throw the best celebration ever!