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Home Alone is a Christmas movie, and a ridiculously contrived one at that. Forget subtlety, this is one of these movies that seems to be sending the message, "Oi! This is funny. Why aren't you laughing yet, sir?" In my case, the answer was that I don't find it funny. I didn't laugh once. Which is bad news for a seasonal comedy.

The movie stars Macauley Culkin as Kevin, one of what seems like a hundred children in the McAllister family. This Christmas the whole family is decamping to France, although most of the children seem only vaguely aware of this. Instead there's a lot of bickering going on in the McAllister household, and watching over it all is Joe Pesci, who is a burglar pretending to be a police officer.

Anyway, all the arguing leads to Kevin hiding in his room and wishing his family would disappear. He then falls asleep, and somehow gets missed at the France headcount the next morning. The family also end up making a frantic dash for the airport too, and before long they're all chilling on a long haul flight to Europe. Kevin, on the other hand, is just waking up to find the house completely empty and, naturally enough, assumes his wish came true.

This isn't the most hilarious of premises for a film but, as ideas go, I suppose it's not bad. The trouble is that the humour for the bulk of the film is basically confined to "What would a young kid do without any adult supervision at all?" gags. The answer is, inter alia, jump up and down on the bed, eat popcorn, read Playboy magazines and, um, shower and keep himself smelling nice. Yes, Kevin's rebelious nature turns out to be very tame indeed.

The burglar from the opening scene however, and his mate (Billy Crystal), obviously now believe the McAllister house to be empty. This is the cue for all the riotous, knockabout fun that the film is most famous for. Having realised the house is indeed under attack, Kevin vows to defend it and hooks up all manner of traps for the bandits to blunder into.

We therefore have a film of roughly three parts. The first bit which leads up to the flight, the middle bit where Kevin's mom discovers he's been left behind and Kevin starts missing the family he wished away. And the last bit with Kevin Vs. Burglars, with all the slapstick violence. It's the third bit that everyone remembers and is the bit which children find hilarious, likely because it's cartoon violence without consequence.

The problem is that there's just not a lot to it. Some scenes, especially those in the middle, really do drag on. Kevin going shopping and talking to the checkout operator, for example, is devoid of laughs and goes nowhere. There's a strange man too, one that terrifies Kevin seemingly just because he never speaks and has a beard. However, there's also not a lot to this relationship either. Kevin offers him some advice. He takes it. It turns out to be good advice. The end.

And that's really where Home Alone fails for me. Everything that is in the movie is only there to make the movie actually move along. It is why it feels so contrived. Without the argument the night before Christmas, Kevin would presumably just have called the police. Without the mad dash to the airport, he wouldn't have been overlooked. Without the bandits, he'd have just sat wanking over Playboys until mom unexpectedly materialised again and killed the mood. And without the strange man, the bandits would've torn the smug-faced cretin limb from limb, which I would personally have found a much more satisfying ending.

Bah humbug.

OK, it's not all bad. John Candy's role as a good samaritan with terrible bedside manner elicited a wry smile from me. And, although Kevin is irritating, the grown-ups for the most part play it straight instead of clowning around (burglars exempted), making for a scenario that you can kid yourself almost seems plausible... sometimes.

I don't recommend this movie. It's basically background noise for when your children are opening their presents. Personally, if I'd had a kid as irritating as Kevin I'd probably have wished him out of existence and believed all my Christmasses had come at once when everyone else in my family developed amnesia about him.