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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Mel O&#039;Drama" data-source="post: 434294" data-attributes="member: 23">Home Alone (1990) / Home Alone2: Lost In New York (1992) <img src="https://external-content.duckduckgo.com/iu/?u=https%3A%2F%2Fi.etsystatic.com%2F23402008%2Fr%2Fil%2F60eb8f%2F2375197799%2Fil_570xN.2375197799_k67o.jpg&f=1&nofb=1&ipt=ebcdfafb552f524de5e0ca8e7c900a420bd40c7785c97ef0adcf321ecb601c08" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " style="width: 535px" />  <img src="https://external-content.duckduckgo.com/iu/?u=https%3A%2F%2Fi.etsystatic.com%2F23402008%2Fr%2Fil%2Fb2ffb5%2F3270913016%2Fil_fullxfull.3270913016_9u8x.jpg&f=1&nofb=1&ipt=d2d4cae4d3f693e2137830de0ba53c8e5748b8aab4f732d7ff790afd52c1d9fa" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " style="width: 535px" /> Little did I imagine that the Christmas Day telly offerings would be so poor that a highlight would be an oft-repeated film almost three and a half decades old. Much less that I would end up breaking a couple of key own rules on film viewing  etiquette and end up enjoying myself in the process.The first rule: never begin watching a film franchise with a sequel,  the reasons for which are probably obvious to anyone who doesn't enjoy spoilers. The second rule: avoid watching films on outlets with commercial breaks. Any film purist will tell you this is crucial to enjoy a truly immersive experience. But there was bugger all else on TV, so when Home Alone 2: Lost In New York  came on the air and we had a house guest who seemed keen (also never having seen it), I was a bit stuck.I've avoided the Home Alone films ever since they came out. Not exactly actively so, but I've just never felt minded to watch. Precocious kids are among my least-favourite things on the planet, which must be a significant factor. Still, with the opening credits rolling as I was resigning myself to watching at least a bit of it, there was some hope. Tim Curry's name loomed large. And there was Brenda Fricker.The direction of the film was quite striking and, as I watched, I found myself deciding that some of these visuals and scenes would be hitting the same notes as the original film. Until I watched the first film the following evening, I didn't realise quite how many were reprised. Indeed, the second film probably feels like a remake as much as a sequel. Or at least it would have done had I watched them in chronological order.In the end, I've decided I watched the films in the correct order. Had I watched the sequel after the original I may have got too hung up on its lack of originality and its karaoke reprises of lines, motifs and set pieces from the first. Instead, I enjoyed it on its own merits and grew to really love its tone. Particularly in the second half when the cartoony violence ensued and I realised it's simply a WB animation made real. Like the Road Runner, the antagonists were subjected to life-changing injuries that would kill anyone several times over. But they get up, shake themselves off in annoyance and go in for more. I was surprised how enjoyable I found this silly, glaring lack of reality.When it came to watching the original, it came with a sense of déjà vu. But of course I had already had my experience with the sequel so it was too late to ruin my view of that. And I couldn't hold anything against the original since this had come first. Instead I found myself running a kind of experiment to see how much of this film I recognised as having made its way into the sequel. Which is a fairly large percentage. The sequel attempts to broaden the pallet with variations on the theme which I suppose works well. It may lack the home invasion factor, which justified a lot of the violence in the original, but the sequel's justification came instead from the history between Kevin and the two antagonists and the fact that they (understandably) craved revenge.Anyway, I've probably already gone into too much detail. These are films best enjoyed with the brain disengaged, which makes them perfect for Christmas.There's talk of watching the third one, which has a completely different cast and crew, but I'm quite resistant. Lines have to be drawn somewhere. Don't they? </blockquote>

Verification: What month follows July?