Live action retelling of the classic holiday story about a reclusive creature bent on destroying Christmas for the residents of Whoville.

This truly is a 'retelling'; although the focus never strays, much is added to the television version of the story we've all come to know and love. Jim Carrey is his old self as the despicable Grinch. His performance is both predictable and entertaining.

Director Howard uses many of the Whoville symbols we're familiar with and portrays The Grinch in an acceptable manner. The Who inhabitants, however, never come off as the lovable, peaceful folk, I always thought they were. They appear, amazingly enough, as too human. This is, of course, one way to modernize the story, but I'm disappointed that my lofty opinion of the Whos as a collective body of peaceful perfection, has been tarnished.

Scenes of The Grinch's dark and dank lair are represented as such and filmed well. But the upbeat, pretty and happy town of Whoville seemed dark too. Although there's much color in the goings on of the town, it all seems fairly washed out. And the photography of Whoville contains little decent composition, given the remarkable subject matter with which they had to work.

Although it may sound like it, I'm not panning this film, it is a worthy Christmas picture that kids should have a lot of fun with. But it seems to me that the production was given fantastic raw material and wasn't able to place too much added value to it.

Directed by Ron Howard.