It's kind of surprising how much of Home Alone 2 works despite more or less shamelessly rehashing the original film and just swapping out the location. Hell, it even has a better cast. Of course, I also have to laugh at the title because, when you think about it, this time nobody's home.
It's one year later and the McCallister family is once again getting ready to travel during the holidays. This time they are headed to Miami and Kevin (played by Macaulay Culkin) is less than thrilled at the prospect of spending Christmas in a tropical climate and I have to agree. Fully aware of what happened the year prior, Kevin's mother Kate (played by Catherine O'Hara) makes sure Kevin doesn't get left behind this time. Things go south when Kevin gets separated from his family as they run to their gate. Kevin winds up following a stranger onto the wrong flight and winds up in New York while his family lands in Miami. However, Kevin finds himself surprisingly resourceful, managing to get a cab into the city and securing a reservation at the Plaza Hotel using his father's credit card (complete with a gratuitous cameo from then owner and current Presidential "candidate" Donald Trump). The ruse works for the most part, except for the suspicions of the hotel concierge Mr. Hector (played by Tim Curry). From there, Kevin tours the city, makes a stop at a large toy store, runs into a scary bird lady in Central Park (played by Brenda Fricker), who of course later turns out to not be so scary and eventually crosses paths with the newly escaped Harry (played Joe Pesci) and Marv (played by Daniel Stern). In a moment of ill-advised monologuing, the two professional gluttons for punishment divulge to young Kevin their intentions to rob the toy store at midnight on Christmas Eve. Kevin knows the owner of the store, Mr. Duncan (played by Eddie Bracken) was planning to donate all the proceeds for the day to the local Children's Hospital. Deciding it's up to him to stop the two nitwit crooks, Kevin breaks into his Uncle Rob's under renovation Brownstone and sets up another series of elaborate traps to teach these two another much needed Christmas lesson.
Home Alone 2 is a pretty lazy sequel for the most part, shamelessly rehashing the original film from beginning to end, but everything is just bigger. Which makes sense since they clearly had more money this time around. But yet, I don't hate it. Maybe its just the nostalgia talking, but I still laughed all the way through this film. It's the little things that work for me. Eddie Bracken as the kindly toy store owner, Brenda Fricker as the bird lady in Central Park and the friendship that develops between her and Kevin. The comedic MVP for me though is Tim Curry. He takes his relatively small role and plays up every moment with gusto. In particular there is a moment towards the end where he is being rather condescending towards Kate and her desire to go out in the city to look for Kevin and she just slaps him across the face. He then immediately changes his tune, telling her to bundle up and then proceeds to look like he's about to cry. It cracks me up every time I watch it. And then there is Joe Pesci and Daniel Stern. They gave big performances in the first film because they were sure no one would see it. Here, they let loose even more because they both know they are basically in a live action cartoon. Especially Daniel Stern, who gives a very funny performance as Marv. I even feel sympathy for poor Marv, because after this film's set of traps, he should have died ten times over. The traps are certainly much more severe this time around too, with electrocutions, crushing head blows, fire and explosions come left, right and center. Granted, these two guys by all means have it coming, but there is a level of cruelty this time around that is a little disturbing to my now adult sensibilities.
Overall, revisiting Home Alone 2 has become all too clear one of those more of the same Hollywood sequels. It's no mystery why 95% of the cast and crew bailed after this entry and I hate to break it to you faithful readers but this is where I stop too. I have seen parts of Home Alone 3 and it is excruciating to watch. Nor do I have any desire to watch the two TV movie sequels either because I'm sure they are even worse. Nope, two is plenty for me. The two from my youth that I can rewatch and enjoy with my rose tinted nostalgia glasses and that is just fine with me.
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