A Heaping Helping of Christmas Turkey

I'm not exactly sure what to make of director Chazz Palminteri's film Noel. I'm not sure what he's trying to make of the film, either. It's certainly unique in the way it has been released. Noel is being presented via a limited theatrical run, a unique DVD rental scheme, and finally, the film was broadcast on TNT as a special presentation on Sunday, November 28th.

Noel is definitely not first-run theatrical material. Had I paid $8 to see this I would feel ill-used, to say the least. Nor is it really worth spending the $5 price for a Flex-Play DVD rental. Basically, this is a DVD that you buy for $5 with a 48-hour viewing window. Once that package has been opened and the disc is exposed to oxygen, it begins to deteriorate and self-destructs in 48 hours. Which may not be a bad thing for Noel.

But why would anyone pay good money to see this holiday turkey when it could be seen for free on TNT? Bad enough you'll waste two hours of your valuable time on Noel, so why throw away good money too?

Noel is the story of a series of misfits who each have a problem of sorts with the holiday season. First of them is Susan Sarandon as Rose. She's a single over forty-something who has her hands full taking care of her mom, who is hospitalized with Alzheimer's disease. She can't seem to meet the right guy, even though a much-younger co-worker has the hots for her. She gives him the cold shoulder, of course- an exposition of her superior moral character.

Robin Williams plays a mysterious visitor to a patient in the room over from Rose's mom. He and Rose strike up a friendship of sorts. Marcus Thomas is another troubled individual. He's had a bad childhood, and the only fond memory he has of Christmas is the one spent in a hospital as a fourteen year old. So, he breaks his hand to get in the hospital in hopes of reliving that Christmas past. It's the viewer that needs the real break, here, however.

And then there's Paul Walker as an overly jealous cop. He̢۪s so possessive of his gal, played by Penelope Cruz, that he drives her away-and then spends the rest of the film trying to get her back. He's distracted from that task by Alan Arkin, who has perhaps the most bizarre role in the entire film.

Arkin's character is convinced that Walker is his dead wife reincarnated, or so it seems. Stranger yet is Walker's reaction. He seems to take it a lot better than most guys would, I think. Especially if those guys were preoccupied with winning back Penelope Cruz.

Sorry, Chazz, but the story here struck me as outright ridiculous. The connection between the various characters is tenuous at best, and there's just not enough plot to tie the whole thing together. Just a lot of exposition about a lot of characters that we just never care about.

And that's a shame, because the acting (and cast) here is quite good. Sarandon is convincing in her role, as is Arkin. More's the pity then that their roles are as ludicrous as they are. The only exception is Robin Williams, who manages to salvage his character as well as his performance.

All in all, Noel is a forgettable film that just doesn̢۪t seem to get its act together. And while it's true that the Flexplay DVD version may self-destruct in 48 hours, the film itself manages to do that in the first twenty minutes. What a waste of perfectly good plastic.