Dr Seuss' How the Grinch Stole Christmas

Dr. Seuss' How the Grinch Stole Christmas (promoted theatrically as The Grinch) is a 2000 American family comedy Christmas film from Universal Pictures and Imagine Entertainment, based on the 1957 story of the same name by Dr. Seuss. It was the first Dr. Seuss book to be adapted into a full-length feature film. Because the film is based on a children's picture book, many additions had to be made to the storyline to bring it up to feature-length, including some information about the backstory of the titular character. Most of the rhymes used in the book were used in the film, though some were slightly changed, and new rhymes were put in as well. The film was directed by Ron Howard, produced by Howard and Brian Grazer, and starring Jim Carrey, Jeffrey Tambor, Christine Baranski, Bill Irwin, Molly Shannon and introducing Taylor Momsen as Cindy Lou Who.
The film spent four weeks as the number-one film in the United States. The Grinch is the highest-grossing holiday film of all time with $345,141,403 worldwide. It won the Academy Award for Best Makeup, and was also nominated for Best Art Direction and Best Costume Design.
==Plot==
All the Whos down in Whoville enjoy celebrating Christmas with much happiness and joy, except for the cynical and misanthropic Grinch (Jim Carrey), who hatefully despises Christmas and the Whos with great wrath and occasionally pulls dangerous and harmful practical jokes on them. As a result, no one likes or cares for him. Meanwhile, six-year-old Cindy Lou (Taylor Momsen) believes everyone is missing the point about Christmas by being more concerned about the gifts and festivities. Cindy Lou eventually learns that the Grinch is real and becomes interested in his history; she asks everyone what they know about him, and soon discovers that he has a tragic past.
The Grinch actually arrived in Whoville by mistake when he was a baby, and was adopted by two elderly sisters. Although he showed some sadistic tendencies as a child, he was rather timid and not the cruel, selfish person he would become; he was ridiculed by his classmates (particularly by Augustus May Who, the current Mayor of Whoville) because of his appearance, with the exception of Martha May Whovier, who was courted by both the Grinch and May Who. One Christmas season, he made a gift for Martha, but attempted to shave his face, cutting himself and when the school saw his face covered with shaving tape the next morning, they laughed at him. He lost his temper, went on a rampage and ran away to live on Mt. Crumpit. After he left though, Martha saw the gift he made and was disheartened.
Cindy Lou, touched by this story, decides to make the Grinch the main participant of the Whobilation, to the great displeasure of Mayor May Who, who reluctantly agrees after pressure from the townspeople, who have been warmed by Cindy Lou's generous spirit. When Cindy Lou goes to Mt. Crumpit and offers an invitation to the Grinch, he turns her down. He gradually changes his mind, however, due to the promise of an award, the presence of Martha at the celebration and the chance to upset the Mayor. Just as the Grinch is enjoying himself and is almost won over, May Who gives him an electric shaver as a present, reminding him of his humiliation at school. May Who then asks Martha to marry him, promising her a new car in return. This causes the Grinch to openly berate the Whos for thinking that Christmas is about gifts that they will just dispose of later, in the hopes of making them too ashamed to celebrate the holiday. He then goes on to ruin the party by burning the Christmas tree with a flamethrower.
When he discovers that his attack has not removed the spirit of Christmas from the Whos, the Grinch instead concocts a plan to steal all of their presents while they are sleeping. Creating a Santa suit and sleigh, the Grinch flies around Whoville, stealing all of the Whos' Christmas gifts. He is almost discovered by Cindy Lou, but concocts a lie that allows him to get away. The next day, the Whos discover the Grinch's scheme, and May Who denounces Cindy Lou as the root of this catastrophic disaster. However, her father, Lou Lou Who, finally stands up to him and reminds everyone that they still have the Christmas Spirit and that the principal meaning of Christmas is to spend it with family and friends. The people accept his speech and begin to sing. Hoping that the change of mood would inspire the Grinch, Cindy Lou goes to Mt. Crumpit to find him.
The Grinch reveals that he intends to push the stolen gifts off the top of the mountain after he hears the Whos crying. However, instead of crying, he hears the joyful singing of the Whos. Infuriated about the failure of his plan, the Grinch has an epiphany about what Christmas is really about: not material gifts, but spending time with loved ones, an insight that profoundly touches him and causes his heart to grow to three times its original size. When the sleigh full of stolen gifts begins to go over the edge of the cliff, the Grinch desperately tries to save them to no avail. However, when he realizes Cindy Lou has come to wish him a merry Christmas and is in danger of falling off the cliff with the sleigh, the Grinch finds enough strength to lift the sleigh, the gifts and Cindy Lou to safety. After a long descent down Mt. Crumpit, the Grinch returns to Whoville with Cindy and the gifts. He confesses to the burglary and apologizes for his actions towards the Whos, who reconcile with the Grinch. Martha turns down May Who's proposal and decides that she would rather stay with the Grinch instead. The redeemed Grinch starts a new life with the Whos, commemorating the Christmas feast with them in his cave.
==Chapters==
#A Whoville Christmas
#Meet the Grinch
#Cindy Lou's Savior
#Christmas, Why Can't I Find You?
#No Place Like Home
#The Grinch's Story
#Cindy Lou's Candidate
#The Invitation
#Second Thoughts
#The Holiday Cheermeister
#The Grinch's Revenge
#A Wonderful, Awful Idea
#You're a Mean One, Mr. Grinch
#Grinchy Claus
#To Take Every Present
#Christmas Destroyed
#A Change of Heart
#To Save Cindy Lou
#Merry Christmas, Mr. Grinch
#End Titles
==Cast==
* Jim Carrey as the Grinch, a green creature who hatefully despises Christmas and the Whos of Whoville. It is revealed in his origin story that he started to hate Christmas after his school classmates humiliated him when he tried to shave his face. Before Jim Carrey was cast to play the Grinch, Jack Nicholson, Robin Williams, Dustin Hoffman, Tom Hanks, Tim Curry and Eddie Murphy were briefly considered.
**Josh Ryan Evans as an 8-year-old Grinch; his humiliation at school by May Who is what drives him into a hatred of Christmas.
* Taylor Momsen as Cindy Lou Who, a young Who who thinks the Christmas spirit in Whoville is lost. (In this version, she is six years old, whereas in the book in 1957 and TV special in 1966 by Chuck Jones she was "no more than two").
* Jeffrey Tambor as Mayor Augustus May Who, Whoville's rude, arrogant, and judgmental mayor. He is revealed to be a school bully who picked on the young Grinch over his shaved face, which is what motivated the Grinch to hate Christmas in the first place. He also denounces the Grinch every chance he gets and wants to have a Grinch-less Christmas.
** Ben Bookbinder as an 8-year-old Augustus May Who; he tormented the young Grinch, which then motivated the Grinch to hate Christmas.
* Christine Baranski as Martha May Whovier, the Grinch's lifelong crush and the romantic interest of May Who. She ultimately rejects the Mayor and chooses the Grinch.
** Landry Allbright as an 8-year-old Martha May Whovier. She shows compassion towards the young Grinch.
* Bill Irwin as Lou Lou Who, Cindy Lou's father and the postman of Whoville.
* Molly Shannon as Betty Lou Who, Cindy Lou's mother and a rival to Martha May in a house-lighting contest.
* Kelley as Max the Dog and Frank Welker as his voice, who is the Grinch's pet dog and only companion on Mt. Crumpit. It is unknown how or when The Grinch got him.
* Clint Howard as Whobris, the mayor's sycophantic aid.
**Reid Kirchenbauer as an 8-year-old Whobris.
* Mindy Sterling as Clarnella Who, one of the Grinch's childhood caretakers
* Jeremy Howard and T. J. Thyne as Drew Lou and Stu Lou Who, troublesome sons of Lou and Betty, and brothers to Cindy Lou.
* Jim Meskimen as Officer Wholihan, the chief of police.
* Anthony Hopkins as the Narrator.
* Bryce Dallas Howard as a surprised Who
== Production ==
On September 16, 1998, it was announced that Howard would direct and co-produce a live-action adaptation of How the Grinch Stole Christmas with Jim Carrey attached to star. It was also reported that Universal Pictures, who had acquired the distribution rights, paid $9 million for the film rights for an adaptation of Grinch and Oh, the Places You'll Go! to Geisel. Before Howard signed on, Tim Burton was considered to direct but he turned it down due to a scheduling conflict with Sleepy Hollow. Jeffrey Price and Peter S. Seaman (of both Who Framed Roger Rabbit and Doc Hollywood fame) wrote the final screenplay following eight drafts, but Geisel also had veto power over the script. She objected to several jokes and sexual innuendos in the screenplay, including one about a family who did not have a Christmas tree or presents jokingly called the "Who-steins" and the placement of a stuffed trophy of the Cat in the Haton the Grinch's wall. Alec Berg, David Mandel and Jeff Schaffer (who were also writers on the television series Seinfeld) did an uncredited rewrite of the script.
The film was shot between September 1999 and January 2000. Geisel visited the set in October 1999. Much of the Whoville set was constructed on the backlot of Universal Studios behind the Bates Motel set from Psycho. Rick Baker was hired to design and create the film's prosthetic makeup for Carrey and the rest of the cast. It took a number of tests, and ultimately Carrey admiring a photo of Baker in his first test makeup, for the decision to use Baker's original makeup design. The Grinch suit was covered in yak hair, dyed green and sewed onto a spandex suit. The application of the makeup took up to 2 and a half hours, after which a frustrated Carrey kicked a hole in the wall of his trailer. Carrey's makeup artist Kazu Hiro recounted, "On set, [Carrey] was really mean to everybody and at the beginning of the production they couldn't finish. After two weeks we only could finish three days' worth of shooting schedule, because suddenly he would just disappear and when he came back, everything was ripped apart. We couldn't shoot anything." Kazu Hiro left production until Baker and Howard had a discussion with Carrey on how important Kazu Hiro was to the production. Carrey agreed to keep his anger in check and Kazu Hiro returned to his role. Meanwhile, Josh Ryan Evans, who played the 8-year old Grinch, wore the same style of makeup and bodysuit that Carrey wore. In total, Carrey spent 92 days in the Grinch makeup and became adept at remaining calm while sitting in the make-up chair. Most of the appliances the actors wore were noses that connected to an upper lip along with a few dentures, ears and wigs.
== Soundtrack ==
The film's score was written by James Horner and included several Christmas songs include Va who fores from the cartoon as well as an original song Where are you Christmas which served as the theme for the movie.
== Reception ==
How the Grinch Stole Christmas grossed $260 million domestically and $85.1 million in other territories for a worldwide gross of $345.1 million, becoming the sixth highest-grossing film of 2000.
In the United States, How the Grinch Stole Christmas opened at number-one on its opening day, making $15.6 million, with a weekend gross of $55.1 million, for an average of $17,615 from 3,127 theaters. Upon its opening, the film had the sixth-highest three-day opening weekend of any film, behind Toy Story 2, X-Men, Mission: Impossible 2, Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace and The Lost World: Jurassic Park. Moreover, the film surpassed Batman Forever to have the largest opening weekend for a Jim Carrey film. How the Grinch Stole Christmas even had the biggest opening weekend for a Ron Howard film, smashing the previous record held by Ransom. It was the first non-Disney film to win the Thanksgiving weekend box office since Mrs. Doubtfire in 1993. The film held the record for the highest opening weekend for a Christmas-themed film for 18 years until the 2018 film version of The Grinch surpassed it with $67.6 million. In its second weekend, the film grossed $52.1 million, dropping only 5.1%, settling a new record for highest-grossing second weekend for any film at the time, beating The Phantom Menace. The film stayed at the top of the box office for four weekends until it was overtaken by What Women Want and Dude, Where's My Car? in mid-December. How the Grinch Stole Christmas continued to draw in holiday crowds while defeating another family-oriented film, The Emperor's New Groove. By this point, it surpassed Mission: Impossible 2 to become the top-grossing film of the year. The film closed on March 1, 2001, with a final domestic gross of $260,044,825. Box Office Mojo estimates that the film sold over 48.1 million tickets in North America.
On Rotten Tomatoes, How the Grinch Stole Christmas holds an approval rating of 49% based on 142 reviews and an average rating of 5.6/10. The website's critical consensus reads, "Jim Carrey shines as the Grinch. Unfortunately, it's not enough to save this movie. You'd be better off watching the TV cartoon." On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 46 out of 100 based on 29 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews". Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "A-" on an A+ to F scale.
Despite the mixed reception, Jim Carrey's performance as the title character received praise from critics and audiences.
Roger Ebert gave the film two out of four stars, referring to it as "a dank, eerie, weird movie about a sour creature" and said, "There should be ... a jollier production design and a brighter look overall ... It's just not much fun." Ebert observed that Carrey "works as hard as an actor has ever worked in a movie, to small avail". Nevertheless, he decided that "adults may appreciate Carrey's remarkable performance in an intellectual sort of way and give him points for what was obviously a supreme effort".
Paul Clinton of CNN declared that Carrey "was born to play this role" and noted that "Carrey carries nearly every scene. In fact, if he's not in the scene, there is no scene." Owen Gleiberman of Entertainment Weekly began his review of the film analyzing the Grinch's "mischievously divided, now-I'm-calm/ now-I'm-a-raving-sarcastic-PSYCH-o! personality" and summed up Carrey's Grinch as "a slobby, self-loathing elitist ruled by the secret fear that he's always being left out of things." Gleiberman expressed surprise at "how affecting Carrey makes the Grinch's ultimate big-hearted turnaround, as Carrey the actor sneaks up on Carrey the wild-man dervish. In whichever mode, he carreys [sic] the movie."
Peter Stack of the San Francisco Chronicle said, "Nobody could play the Grinch better than Jim Carrey, whose rubbery antics and maniacal sense of mischief are so well suited to How the Grinch Stole Christmas. Dr. Seuss himself might have turned to Carrey as a model for the classic curmudgeon had the actor been around in 1957." However, he wondered why Carrey "made himself sound like Sean Connery" and warned that the character's intensity may frighten small children. James Berardinelli of ReelViews wrote that Carrey's "off-the-wall performance is reminiscent of what he accomplished in The Mask, except that here he never allows the special effects to upstage him. Carrey's Grinch is a combination of Seuss' creation and Carrey's personality, with a voice that sounds far more like a weird amalgamation of Sean Connery and Jim Backus (Bond meets Magoo!) than it does Karloff." He concluded that Carrey "brings animation to the live action, and, surrounded by glittering, fantastical sets and computer-spun special effects, Carrey enables Ron Howard's version of the classic story to come across as more of a welcome endeavor than a pointless re-tread."
Some reviews were more polarized. Stephanie Zacharek of Salon in a generally negative review of the film, wrote that "Carrey pulls off an admirable impersonation of an animated figure ... It's fine as mimicry goes – but mimicry isn't the best playground for comic genius. Shouldn't we be asking more of a man who's very likely the most gifted comic actor of his generation?" She concluded that in spite of "a few terrific ad-libs ... his jokes come off as nothing more than a desperate effort to inject some offbeat humor into an otherwise numbingly unhip, nonsensical and just plain dull story".
Todd McCarthy of Variety wrote, "Carrey tries out all sorts of intonations, vocal pitches and delivery styles, his tough guy posturing reminding at times of Cagney and his sibilant S's recalling Bogart. His antic gesturing and face-making hit the mark at times, but at other moments seem arbitrary and scattershot. Furthermore, his free-flowing tirades, full of catch-all allusions and references, are pitched for adult appreciation and look destined to sail right over the heads of pre-teens."
Many critics did praise the film for giving the Grinch more of a backstory as it was better than leaving his hatred toward Christmas a mystery. He was also given a love interest and a better relationship with Cindy Lou Who. In recent years, the film has received better acclaim than the earlier years of it release, many referring to it as a cult classic.
== Trivia ==
* Over the years the film has mixed reviews among audiences while some people despise the acting, others like the story itself.
===Extended edition===
The TV airings, first aired on ABC on November 25, 2004, added in the following scenes that weren't featured in the theatrical/home media releases:
*Lou maxing out a credit card in one of the stores.
*Lou talking with Cindy Lou before heading to the post office.
*An extended scene of Lou sending out three more packages at the post office.
*A parent-teacher conference where Betty and Lou discuss Cindy Lou's report on the Grinch.
*Augustus asking out Martha while she decorates her house.
*The Grinch sitting on a swing in his cave.
*An extended sequence of the Grinch trying to scare Cindy Lou.
*The lighting contest between Martha and Betty.
*The Grinch trying to decide on an outfit to wear to the Whobilation.
*The Grinch breaking Whoville's eggnog record during Whobilation.
*The entirety of the present pass-it-on sequence.
*Dru and Stu getting ready for bed.
*Betty wrapping presents in frustration.
Category:2000 films
Category:2000s comedy films
Category:American comedy films
Category:American films
Category:American Christmas films
Category:English-language films
Category:Films based on works by Dr. Seuss
Category:Films based on children's books
Category:Films featuring anthropomorphic characters
Category:Films that won the Academy Award for Best Makeup
Category:Children's fantasy films
Category:American children's fantasy films
Category:Films produced by Brian Grazer
Category:Films directed by Ron Howard
Category:Universal Pictures films
Category:Imagine Entertainment films
Category:Santa Claus in film
Category:Films
Category:Fourth Wall
Category:Films with a single song
Category:Films with narration
Category:Films starring Jim Carrey
Category:Universal Family Films
Category:Films starring Jeffrey Tambor
Category:Films starring Taylor Momsen
Category:Films starring Anthony Hopkins
Category:Films starring Clint Howard
Category:Films starring Mindy Sterling
Category:Rated PG