It's Official: The Nativity Story is a Good Movie

I saw The Nativity Story and my review is here. The reason that I say it's officially a good movie is because in today's issue of The Orange County Register, they gave it a "C". To my recollection, the Register has never yet given a good rating to a solid family-oriented film. We've learned that when a family film gets a mediocre rating from The Register, it's time to go see it because it's probably pretty good.

Here's how their review starts:

If her name weren't at the top of the credits, you'd never believe Catherine Hardwicke directed "The Nativity Story."

Gone is the vibrant energy of her 2005 skateboarding adventure, "Lords of Dogtown," as is the visceral intensity of her debut film, the junior-high drama "thirteen."

Working from a thoroughly researched script by Mike Rich ("The Rookie," "Finding Forrester"), Hardwicke depicts the birth of Christ in such a lifeless, suffocatingly earnest manner, you'd swear she made the movie specifically to be shown in Sunday school classes – or perhaps on the Hallmark Channel.

What does she want - skateboarding shepherds? The reviewer must require constant stimulation in order to stay focused.

She add this (and this is probably the only thing she gets right in the whole review):

The gospels of Matthew and Luke address Christ's infancy, but little has been known, or shown, about mom and dad before that night in the manger. Most in the audience will walk away feeling that they've learned a thing or two.

Exactly! One of the great things about this movie was how it humanized the Bible story and made the characters we see in creche scenes into real people. I'm sorry the reviewer found herself so bored, but for those who love and believe the Biblical story, they will find this movie anything but boring.

Meanwhile, in the same issue of the paper, they rated another movie a "B". That move is called Candy and is described as "two junkies in love". I wonder if they used skateboards? And a couple of weeks ago, the crude Borat received an "A".

If it really came down to it, would these reviewers rather their kids go to see Borat, Candy or The Nativity Story?