Film

Can someone please establish a Vince Vaughn Support Group? Not for people who consistently flee Vaughn’s brand of obnoxious mouth spew. I mean a group for us fans—and maybe even for Vaughn himself. Big guy’s in trouble. Not so long ago, 2005’s Wedding Crashers perfected his aggro, hyperdefensive persona and 2006’s The Break-Up revealed hidden depths. (Jennifer Aniston remains his perfect foil.)

These days, though, Vaughn evidently wants to be Bing Crosby. Much like last year’s execrable Fred Claus, Four Christmases confuses him for a sweet romantic lead who, once all the barbs fall away, stands as naked as a tinseled pine tree in January. The greatest holiday gift one could give Vaughn would be a new agent.

Rotating her Oscar statuette so it can’t see her, Reese Witherspoon plays Kate, a chirpy San Fran yuppie whose three-year relationship with Brad (Vaughn) seems to have hit a perfect stride of sexy affection and noncommittal functionality. We’re meant to think they’re on couples autopilot, burbling niceties in bed, so when a heavy runway fog waylays their annual escape, they are forced to confront two sets of divorced parents, spewing infants, top-heavy cousins and the yawning chasm of their own babyless existence.

At first, Four Christmases seems merely a repeat of the National Lampoon movies, complete with falling-off-the-roof high jinks and bad family photos. (“That’s not a boy named Bjorn?” Brad asks of a snap of young Kate.) But a deeper stench asserts itself when you realize how thoroughly the couple’s independence is vilified. Breeding never had a worse infomercial.