There's nothing like waking up on Christmas morning to the smell of freshly brewed coffee and serious dysfunction.

Wow. You would have to really hate a holiday to make a movie this bad about it.

Surviving Christmas stars Ben Affleck as Drew Latham, a successful advertising executive who has more money than human feeling. (By the way, Hollywood, don’t you think it’s possible that there are smarmy, shallow people in the world who don’t work in advertising? Hint: look around.) After his girlfriend dumps him because he wants to go to Fiji for Christmas, Drew has a long, dark night of the soul, or an identity crisis, or possibly a psychotic break. In any case, he ends up renting a family to recreate the happy, homespun holidays of his childhood.

He may have wanted to shop around a bit, because the family he ends up with ain’t exactly the Waltons. Mom and Dad (James Gandolfini and Catherine O’Hara) bicker constantly. Teenage son Brian (Josh Zuckerman) hides out in his room surfing the internet. (Did you know there’s porn out there?) And grown daughter Alicia (Christina Applegate) isn’t thrilled about having to pretend this wild-eyed stranger is her brother. (Bitch.)

There are a few things right with Surviving Christmas. For one thing, it’s impossible for Catherine O’Hara to not be funny. Gandolfini is also good as the short-tempered father. And Christina Applegate makes an appealing lead. She’s not given a lot to work with here, but she makes the most of what there is.

I can understand the impulse.

I also liked the idea that Drew is incapable of making a simple gesture or enjoying a quiet moment. Everything he does is big and flashy and completely misses the point. It’s an interesting character quirk. Or would be if well acted.

Unfortunately, I’m not really sure what Ben Affleck thought he was playing. His over-enthusiasm for Drew’s over-enthusiasm sends him careening into caricature until he seems less like a guy with a high bank balance and low impulse control and more like Daffy Duck hopped up on caffeine. Honestly, there’s no way Drew could have gotten so successful with such poor social skills.

Let’s see, what else. The set-up is rushed; the screenwriters don’t even make an effort to make their contrived premise seem remotely plausible. (And really, it wouldn’t have been all that hard.) The characters’ emotional states seem to ping-pong back and forth depending on what the story needed them to feel in any given scene. This includes, but is not limited to, my old favorite: Characters Who Fall in Love for No Good Reason.

Oh, and while there are a few good laughs, overall it’s really not that funny. I could forgive just about anything but that.

I don’t know what Christmas did to deserve this, but really, why should the rest of us have to suffer?

Gorilla Pants rating: 1 out of 4 bananas