The App That Stole Christmas (2020) User Reviews

No character development

[laurenzambrano · 2/10 · 21 November 2020]

I regret watching this movie. It was too fast and nothing was explained. Missing a lot of context makes a movie terrible. Dont recommend.

i am in a general state of confusion.

[nobodynose-67234 · 2/10 · 29 December 2021]

It's been over 12 hours since I've watched this movie and I'm still just as confused as I was when I first turned it on. The plot is scattered and there's a lot of scenes that didn't really need to be there. The movie is 63 minutes long, and they have unnecessary scenes. I think that speaks for itself.

The actors weren't bad. Santa made me audibly laugh a couple of times, and Ellen and Ben did great (even though a lot of their lines were awkwardly written). I love the black representation within the cast too, we love to see it.

Buttttt like I said, a lot of the skit was awkward. At one point, the kid says something like "I connected with my friends on the TikTok app", and, I'm sorry, but that's not how children talk. A lot of conversations felt forced and artificial, like the characters were bad NPCs or something. Also, they never explicitly say what the app is. Like, Felix orders Chinese food on it, Ben plays video games on it, you can get things shipped within *20 MINTUES???* on it? Did he create every app?? I don't even know!

Honestly, if someone asked me for a synopsis of this movie, I'd be stumped. It just feels like an fever dream. I'm sorry.

Not an easy watch

[jcujwjagm · 2/10 · 6 December 2020]

Production quality of this short movie was abysmal. The sound was terrible throughout, especially with dialog. Camera angles felt amateur. This movie isn't even bad in a good way. Don't bother.

The worst movie ive seen in my life

[marionosei · 1/10 · 25 November 2020]

Throughout the whole movie it seemed like they were freestyling their lines and just saying anything. There were even times in the movie where it seemed like the actors didn't know what the other actor was trying to say/do. Some lines didn't even make sense and I was smacked watching this movie so this movie had to be some bs. I felt like the writers didn't pull through or this movie was rushed. Yall couldve done a lot better cause wtf. The only thing funny was the little trailer they had before you watch the movie of the security guard who accidentally knocked out his boss. Thats what actually made me want to watch the movie in the first place and then I actually watched it and was disappointed.

Woeful

[tijuarnajane · 1/10 · 7 December 2020]

At an hour in length, it was 60 minutes too long.

You would get more enjoyment counting 3,600 seconds out loud in a pitch black room and have used your time better.

I Can't Unsee This

[wehaynes-09236 · 1/10 · 24 November 2020]

My heavens. This was an absolute waste of fragmented, pointless time. I'm totally at a loss. From bad acting to pointless storyline. I WANTED to like this movie. I wanted to root for it to get better. But sadly that was not the case. The ending was truly a joke. Many missed opportunities to make this worthwhile!

This movie is horrible

[adamlibby · 1/10 · 23 November 2020]

Horrible acting, super short and didn't make any sense at all. Netflix should do us all a favor and remove it from their service.

The app that stole christmas

[quisha-01195 · 1/10 · 22 November 2020]

The whole entire movie made no sense at all,it was very boring,not entertaining at all.

Awful

[thatboz1981 · 1/10 · 29 November 2020]

This is almost the worst movie ever. I don't know where to begin, the acting is shocking. Although the story line has a good meaning it just wasn't delivered well at all and even though the lesson is obvious, the movie didn't teach it well. This movie is so bad it made me write this review, which is my 1st ever IMBD review.

Felt like a tense, never ending YouTube skit

[rnyshnjftqwnejoqit · 22 November 2020]

Felt like something we'd make in high school media class. Bad acting, bad script, good camerawork and quality. Had no idea what was going on half the time. Turned it off in favour of the entire family.

Worst Movie I've EVER seen.

[Ravenclaw148 · 1/10 · 22 November 2020]

Wow. This movie was so poorly developed. The camera man did an amazing job, but the acting and writing were HORRIBLE. He fell on the floor, not even hitting his head...I had no idea what was going on 90% of the time because there were too many inner thoughts out loud and transitions. If you have to do that many asides in a movie, you might need to rethink the writing. The transitions made no sense...a lot of that had to do with misplaced music. The delivery guy coming in the house is a good example of confusion. It really seemed like that was his brother or cousin using his house to impress ladies, not some random dude. RayJ did a better acting job in... well, you know. Jaylin Hall (the kid) was the best actor and I feel so bad for him. Hopefully, he can keep going on The CW. They couldn't even pick a Santa with a real beard? Or make elf ears vs wearing hates with felt ones!?! People go to things like Comic Con and make them themselves. Furthermore, Santa basically kidnapped the app dude and FORCED him to help Santa? What the heck!? Those are just a few examples... I highly recommend you don't waste your time, unfortunately.

The App that Stole Christmas

[Createyourworld · 9/10 · 10 December 2020]

Getting off my app after I do this review. Seriously, we spend too much time on our social media. Let's talk.

BIg problem

[anderson_mb · 7/10 · 6 December 2020]

I want more. watched it 7 times and I can't get enough. I want to know what happens next. Sequel please!!

An assault on the senses

[denk15 · 1/10 · 10 December 2020]

Your time is precious, don't waste it on this title, unless you want your Christmas spirit sucked out of you.

The tagline suggests that what is important is presence, but this movie lacks any kind of presence.

The acting isn't great, but that is to be expected for a low budget indie film, the acting could be forgiven if the other elements of a good film were present, but they were not.

The first sense to be attacked is your hearing, the audio quality is poor and sets the tone for the rest of the movie.

Next it's the dialogue, poorly written and executed. Some forced banter mixed with wildly unneeded lines were cringe worthy and more often than not you will find yourself screaming "Get on with the plot!!!!"...

...But that's the thing, there is nothing here to grab you and not let go. No satisfying progression, no character arch, no fun or Christmas cheer. Instead of grabbing me it's clawing at my ankles like an annoying chihuahua.

The whole amateurishness of this production is at the forefront and I would expect this kind of quality of film and script if I handed a camera to some students and said "Make me a Christmas movie by the end of the day"

It baffles me that anyone working on this film thought it was good enough for public viewing. It's offensive that they think our standards are so low.

Somehow I suspect the reviewers giving top marks worked on the film, or are friends of, especially the one that says "I've seen this 7 times!"... It's akin to self-harm. I would rather watch Battlefield Earth.

Please do yourself a favour, and watch something that deserves to be watched where the creators have actually put in the effort

Not very good

[ThomPoole · 1/10 · 25 November 2020]

Running at just over an hour, this is more a TV special than a movie.

It has the right intentions (presence not presents) but it fails in its execution!

The acting, writing and story as a whole are very sub-par and with the dominance of the soundtrack feels more like a vehicle to promote/ sell the music.

I'd wait until you have seen every other film on your streaming service before you watch this.

I'm awestruck.

[Hakubi · 1/10 · 22 November 2020]

I didn't like anything about this. Literally nothing. Which made it very funny. Everything about this is bad. Everything. But I laughed the whole way through. Nothing is funny, and that's very funny. Every scene could be cut short and I would've only had to waste 30 minutes on this, but I guess that's a con since I got to laugh nonstop for an hour and three minutes. Maybe it should've been three hours, but it's just the same movie three times in a row.

What did I just watch?

[k-verse · 1/10 · 22 December 2021]

No words can describe this mess. My only advice - make it a drinking game. Take a sip every time they say "the app" "quality time" or the wife is overdressed in their one-room staged home.

This movie was missing everything required for a good holiday movie. There was no dialogue just transitions and slang. We never get a full sentence, any character development or even a storyline. Felix apparently found the app (not created) and it does all things and is stealing quality time. Yo, their house didn't even have Christmas decorations and I cannot even talk about Santa's village in Florida. I have no idea what the high reviews are about- this was horrendously bad "movie."

The fact that this 63 minutes of nonsense made it to Netflix might inspire me to write a screenplay.

I wanted to like this, but just couldn't

[tfrager · 1/10 · 23 November 2021]

I wanted to like this movie. I really did. Come on, a black feel-good movie with a good message! A black Santa Claus! I thought it would be awesome. Boy was I wrong. This movie feels as though it's a high school production. Except that I would expect high schoolers to have written a better script, because if they didn't they'd probably fail. The acting wasn't great. The settings were okay. The costumes were okay, but not fantastic. The sets and the costumes not being fantastic would have been okay if the rest of the movie was better. Instead, the lackluster of everything just came together to make a terrible waste of time. If you want to waste an hour, as another reviewer said, just count to 3600 rather than wasting your time with this film.

the people who made this movie commit crimes

[zoeyf-87952 · 2/10 · 10 January 2022]

This movie itself is a crime, is this money laundering or something because how did yall manage to make a high budget look so low budget. Out of all the ATL based movies i've seen lately, this has to be one of the worst. No hate to any of the child actors, the acting was okay. Plot and writing horrific.

There are worse ways to spend an hour!

[toni-michelle · 5/10 · 7 December 2020]

Put this on in the background, start getting those decorations out. A heart-warming, tongue-in-cheek, feel-good tale about the kind of values we want for ourselves and our communities, especially around the holiday season. We absolutely love the piss-take of G.B (Bombazon 😆)! Enjoy, jingle on and Ho Ho, hope all you have a Merry Christmas!

Christmas trash

[qsdfpfb · 2/10 · 16 November 2021]

The writers probably had a stroke at some point in their life and wrote this looking to get back into the real world. Worst acting, script and storyline I've ever seen in my life. This was made by the minds of a middle school film class student. Nah actually, that giving the writers and director too much credit. I feel sorry for whoever had to act on this, now they will have to carry this stain in their careers.

PS. The guy was in a "come" miraculously recover and literally just get up and walk off his bed and hospital without any Dr. Checkup, etc.

Torae rocks!!!!

[dkj-20267 · 10/10 · 12 December 2020]

Listen Torae is so insanely funny. Didn't know he was such a great actor. Gramps (name?) and Torae were the two best actors - great comedic timing

A Christmas winner for black people

[allichand · 7/10 · 20 December 2020]

Finally a holiday movie where black people are portrayed in a great light. All good like it should.

Animation was awesome

[nadersoliman-73233 · 8/10 · 6 December 2020]

Wish there was more animation, but it was overall really good. My favorite part Gramps and Ben having dinner.

Fun but not long enough

[torifulyo · 7/10 · 8 December 2020]

It was over too fast. I had to watch again - best part is when Felix is stuck in a phone app.