Written by: Kelly Younger
Starring: Eddie Murphy, Tracee Ellis Ross, Jillian Bell, Thaddeus J. Mixson, Ken Marino
Rating: [1.5/5]
A bit of healthy competition can serve as a good activity to have in life. It keeps you on your toes and willing to learn more in order to continually improve within this particular competition. However, going far beyond the pale with it can lead you down treacherous roads where it can turn all-consuming or, in the case of Candy Cane Lane, unleash something absolutely strange into the world all in the name of victory.
Living in a neighborhood that highly values decorating for Christmas, Chris Carver (Eddie Murphy) feels displeased each time he loses the competition of the best decorated house when he utilized beautifully carved decorations and his neighbor simply buys large inflatables that do not take effort. Following a lay-off at work and this year’s competition yielding a grand prize of $100,000, it raises the stakes even more. More desperate than ever to win the grand prize, Chris seeks a new way to impress, which he finds a mysteriously new pop-up Christmas store that appears with quite the offering for him.
As a homeowner for a couple of years now, I can somewhat understand the pressures surrounding Chris’s dilemma of trying to have the best exterior in the neighborhood. While in my neighborhood it more so centers on who has the grass yard and garden, we have seen time and time again just how competitive things can get and the pride and joy people have in displaying the best home in some respect. This along with the large influx of cash victory displays what makes this such a stress point for Chris. He gets to provide for his family in addition to finally winning at something he cares so deeply about. A desperation that would lead him to making a bad deal by not reading the fine print that unleashes this strange experience.
When this film shifts into the fantastical in unleashing the elements involved with the 12 Days of Christmas, it originally does what Chris wants in bringing the necessary attention to his home as a potential winner. It certainly puts him in a place above that pesky neighbor who somehow wins every year despite literally only using inflatables. A curious choice given that’s the laziest approach that some may even consider tacky so it does not take much to defeat it in my eyes, but this shortcut to something to present something much more ornate unleashes Pepper (Gillian Bell), a wicked elf, from unleashing her plan and none of it works.
Part of me feels for Gillian Bell, as this role really gave nothing. It pretty much felt like a weight strapped around her neck. She tried to go high camp with this character but combining her elements with all the nonsense happening around her just did her no favors in trying to make this character anything more than a nuisance not only to the characters, but also the audience. Her devious plan involved taking over Christmas in ways that did not remotely reach anything interesting and it just became this pandemonium that proved nonsensical at best and unwatchable at its worst.
Also, on rare occasions should a Christmas film ever reach 2 hours in its runtime. Perhaps those Christmas films that just weave in the holiday can, but this particular brand of holiday movies have their purpose and can outstay their welcome quickly because of the sacrifice in quality to provide the warmth of the holiday. Candy Cane Lane did far more than overstay its welcome, but it kept me as a prisoner in a trap where halfway through this film I just wanted to turn it off, but sunk cost fallacy forced me to finish this ride even if I hated the entire experience. None of the elements involved worked even with a fairly strong cast, which includes Eddie Murphy and Tracee Ellis Ross right at the center of it.
As throwaway as a Christmas film can get, Candy Cane Lane just has nothing really going for it. I can always appreciate a new Eddie Murphy film but this one just did not have anything really to hang onto. The whole premise does not make sense and the rest of it just becomes this horrible mess of things flying everywhere mixed in with terrible digital effects and characters that only made this film a grating experience from beginning to end.
Films with Josh 
