there be one great moment in survive christmas that almost make it worth the pain represent james gandolfini crack a shovel over ben affleck stupid head . this movie serve as yet another unfortunate example of james gandolfini prove what a great actor he be whilst simultaneously besmirch his career by act in this film . young and wealthy ad exec and draw latham ( ben affleck ) have be inculcate into believe that one must never be alone on christmas . ( and there and from the outset and be the underlie problem with our suspension of disbelief in this idiotic movie represent how many people of drew social standing and in 2004 and truly care one way or another whether christmas be spend alone or with half the family or with a fifty dollar prostitute . ) storyline find drew buying off a family to spend christmas with and on the condition that they pretend to be his own and insensately ignore all the indication to the contrary that his money have not buy the emotion he be seek . for $ 250 and 000 and a surly suburban truck driver and tom valco ( james gandolfini ) and and his disheveled wife and christine ( catherine ohara ) and agree to be drew ad hoc family and against protest from their son and brian ( a very one dimensional josh zuckerman ) and daughter and alicia ( a very soft focus christina applegate ) . draw then spend the rest of the movie supposedly recapture his youth or something . the message in this movie be a twisted and illogical a it dry mouth storyline . fraught with overt psychosis and draw plaster a fake smile on his face and blindly remain in denial against every denigration that he be supposedly buy the valco family to avoid . which beg the question represent if drew be pay these people to recapture some semblance of joyous familial emotion and how psychotic must he be to pretend happiness amongst their barb and mental anguish over his presence . it be not a case of the valco family hide their true feeling and pretend to be happy while around draw three of the four member make it patently clear they despise him . be he so incognizant that he can not see that his money be not buy him the family atmosphere he be inculcate into believing be a truth in the first place . a with all movie this opprobrious and one wonder how four screenwriter could possibly get so tangle in their own narcissistic dream of appear in a credit sequence that they will overlook any semblance of plausibility and or intelligence . director mike mitchell and who be responsible for deuce bigalow represent male gigolo stop right there . nuff say . gandolfini and ohara somehow manage to shine and prove their mettle amongst this mess . christina applegate be willowy and cutesy and blond and fiery in all the right place and scathingly cut draw into little strip of carcass for most of the movie and then do an about face and fall in love with him because the script tell her to . and i wouldn not go so far a to say that affleck be a bad actor and but john schneider well look over his shoulder . there a whole new level of desperately seek talent in town .