Alone at Home

Home Alone

Main article: Home Alone (film)

Home Alone is primarily a coming-of-age story about an 8-year old
boy, Kevin. He is the youngest of four and typically gets (as he puts
it) "dumped on". The film opens to chaos in Kevin's house, as he and
his extended family prepare for a vacation to France. Kevin is
aggrieved about having to sleep in the same bed as his younger cousin,
Fuller (who is famous for wetting the bed), and about Buzz (his older
brother) eating his only cheese pizza. He attacks Buzz in the kitchen,
spilling drinks over the airplane tickets and passports. One of the
tickets gets thrown out by mistake as everyone tries to clear up, and
Kevin gets banished to the attic room by his irate mother. On the way
up, he tells her he wishes his whole family would disappear. Kevin's
mum leaves him to sulk, and mentions she'll find somewhere else for
Fuller to sleep.
That night, there is a storm and a tree falls over the
neighborhood's electricity cables, causing a power-cut. The family's
alarm clocks are reset, and they are woken up by two minibus drivers
knocking on the front door. Pandemonian ensues as they realize they've
overslept and might not make the flight. Amongst it, the next-door
neighbor (who is a similar age to Kevin and bundled up in a wooly hat
and coat similar to his) is accidently included in a head-count as
everyone gets into the minibuses. Therefore, they leave the house with
Kevin still asleep in the attic.
Kevin wakes up and can't understand why the house is so quiet. He
notices the cars are still in the garage, promoting him to think his
family can't have left for France yet. He comes to the conclusion his
Christmas wish must have come true and he must have actually made his
family disappear. Cue mad joyous screaming around the house, jumping on
the bed eating popcorn, watching banned films and eating junk food,
raiding his brothers private stuff, etc etc.
Meanwhile his mother feels can't get it out of her head they've
forgotten something. Mid-flight she realises with a shock that it's
Kevin. She is beside herself with worry that Kevin won't be able to
look after himself. In actual fact, Kevin is doing fine, and is
starting to stand on his own two feet: he gets the laundry done, washes
himself properly using his fathers toiletries, and goes to the store
for groceries. The only danger to him are two local burglers, who have
spotted the McAllister house as rich pickings.
The rest of the film follows Harry and Marv as they attempt to
burgle the (almost) vacant house vs Kevin as he does a great job at
defending it with various homemade boobytraps. These include flying
paint cans, a BB gun, and a doorknob heated with an electric charcoal
lighter. This is basically an 8-year-old's dream come to life, and
undoubtably why the film has remained so adored among kids today as
back then.
Meanwhile, Kevin's mother battles to get home to him, and succeeds
in arriving back Christmas morning. The rest of the family walk through
the door soon after, sick of France.
The movie is set around Christmas 1990
and launched a series of sequels and a career for Culkin. John Hughes
and Chris Columbus (the writer and director, respectively),
specifically set out to create a film which captured the essence of
Christmas, but with a modern spin. They wanted Home Alone to be the
type of film which would be shown around the Christmas period for many
years to come, and therefore paid close attention to creating a
"timelessness" to it through the locations, costume, and language used.
John Carpenter wrote the score for Home Alone, which greatly contributed to its feel-good, festive ambience.

Home Alone 2: Lost in New York

Main article: Home Alone 2: Lost in New York

Kevin McCallister and his family are taking another Christmas vacation, this time to Miami, Florida. During the chaos at the airport, Kevin gets separated from his family and accidentally gets on a plane to New York City.
After enjoying himself there for a while, he runs into Harry and Marv
from the original film, who have escaped from prison. Marv, the tall
robber is essentially the "Lackey" and follows Harry's orders into
their demise.
[edit] Home Alone 3

Main article: Home Alone 3

The film does not revolve around Kevin, but centers on Alex Pruitt, a young boy who is home alone with the chickenpox. At this time, four burglars working for a North Korean
terrorist group are sent by their boss to obtain a top-secret microchip
that can act as a cloaking device for a missile. They succeed in
retrieving the chip and hide it in a remote controlled car,
but due to a luggage mix-up at the airport with the Pruitts' neighbor
Mrs. Hess, the car lands in the hands of Alex, who is given the car as
a thank-you present for shoveling the snow on her driveway. The
burglars begin systematically searching every house on Alex's street.
Once they figure out that Alex has the chip, they prepare to invade his
house. Alex devises elaborate traps and bamboozles the 4 crooks with
the help of his pet mouse, his brothers parrot, and some intricate
tripwires, all the while monitoring them with a video camera on his new
race car.
[edit] Home Alone 4: Taking Back the House


The fourth installment of the series, Home Alone 4: Taking Back the House, premiered as a television movie on ABC on November 3, 2002. The film takes place between the first and second movies.^{[citation needed]} Mike Weinberg takes over the role of Kevin McCallister and French Stewart
replaces Stern as Marv Merchants. In the film Kevin's parents have
divorced and he lives with his mom. He decides to go spend Christmas
with his dad and his rich girlfriend, Natalie, but finds himself having
to deal with his old nemesis Marv, and his new sidekick, Vera (played
by Missi Pyle). Directed by Rod Daniel, . It was released to Region 1 DVD on October 20, 2003.