The classic Christmas movie Home Alone first came out in November 1990. Macaulay Culkin, plays the main character of the film: eight-year-old Kevin McCallister, who is not only resourceful but also mischievous. Kevin is left home alone when his family accidentally leaves him for a Christmas vacation in Paris.
At the beginning of the movie, the McCallister family is trying to get what they need to get done while there is a police officer in the house trying to get the kids’ attention. Meanwhile, the mom, Kate McCallister, played by Catherine O’ Hara, is talking to a family friend. By that time, the audience sees Kevin walk in and try to get his mother’s attention about uncle Frank, but his mom waves him off while she is on the phone. Kevin eventually leaves his parents’ bedroom to ask his brother and sister a question, but they shut him up. At the end of the scene, Kevin is sent up to the attic because of the mess that happened in the kitchen. The next morning, the McCallisters are in such a hurry that they end up leaving Kevin behind.
In the middle of the movie, Kevin realizes that he is home alone and gets some household supplies so he can take care of himself, but on the way home, he loses his groceries and is then stopped by a pale blue van that almost runs him over. After Kevin realizes that the driver is the police man who was in his house, he finds him suspicious, and so he makes a little plan to make the two people in the van believe that his family is home for the holidays. The two people that were in the pale blue van were known as the Wet Bandits and we see that during one scene, Harry Lyme, played by Joe Pesci, and Marv Murchins, played by Daniel Stern, are stealing from a house and Marv turns on the sink and lets it flood the house which then earns them the title “the Wet Bandits.”
Unfortunately, Kevin’s plan for making Harry and Marv think that his family is home for Christmas does not work, as they find out that his family is still in Paris. Later that day, Kevin sees Harry and Marv again and leads them on a goose chase throughout the neighborhood, where, eventually, Kevin finds a church and hides in it. By then, Harry and Marv cannot find him, and they give up. As Kevin is in the church, he sees his neighbor, old man Marley, played by Robert Blossom, and they have a nice talk about their family issues and how they could fix them, and Kevin realizes he is not as bad as his big brother Buzz McCallister says he is.
Afterwards, Kevin sets up little traps to catch Harry and Marv and stop them from stealing items from his house. Some of the traps that Kevin sets up are ice on the steps, a very hot doorknob, an iron falling down the laundry shoot, glue and feathers, a blowtorch to the head, coal-tarred stairs with a needle sticking to it, and Buzz’s tarantula. All of these traps were meant to stop or at least slow down Harry and Marv, and they worked, but the traps also made them angrier. The only reason it made them angrier is because Harry and Marv kept on getting caught in Kevin’s traps and Kevin was able to get away from his house by using a homemade zipline that goes all the way to his trees house and by then he goes to his neighbor Old Man Marley. Once Kevin had gotten away from his house, he ran to Old Man Marley’s house, only to have Harry and Marv corner him. While Harry and Marv are trying to decide on how they should deal with Kevin, Old Man Marley comes to Kevin’s rescue by hitting both Harry and Marv with a snow shovel, ultimately saving Kevin and calling the police, which then puts the scene at the capture of Harry and Marv. The end of the film is set during Christmas morning, when Kevin awakes to discover that his family has returned. It offers a closure for Old Man Marley as well, who gets back with his family after being distant from them.
