Dynamixor The performances transcend the film's tropes, grounding it in characters that feel more complete than this subgenre often produces.

SeeQuant Blending excellent reporting and strong storytelling, this is a disturbing film truly stranger than fiction

Ogosmith Each character in this movie — down to the smallest one — is an individual rather than a type, prone to spontaneous changes of mood and sometimes amusing outbursts of pettiness or ill humor.

Tyreece Hulme One of the best movies of the year! Incredible from the beginning to the end.

kill-the-boxtrolls This movie starts off as a spoof reference of 'Oliver Twist', it features a professional theft who releases a kid to steal things. Then, Bert comes in, right before Christmas, who agrees to spend time with the little girl to prevent her from the social services.Now when I had my first experience with 'On the 2nd Day of Christmas', I wasn't astounded but impressed. It featured a lot of good moments, tenderness, happiness, and sometimes mischief but touching scenes. I remember this from 2002 when I was only a kid about nine.I had to watch it again this year, and thought it was too harsh for kids to watch. There is too much stealing, whining, and attempts to run away and that's not fair. I know this is a family movie but please.O.K. enough with the comments, but this movie was actually O.K. Nothing special, but I still like the old Santa Clause movie better.6/10

Imacritic Would not recommend letting children watch a movie that, despite it's unbelievable Harlequin plot line, still could implicitly condone maladaptive behavior. Note the lead character has not only actively stolen from others over a long period of time (how many other children's' Christmases were ruined by this character's thievery?), but used an orphan to assist her. The rewards? A lovely apartment, gorgeous clothes, a cozy family Christmas and a blossoming romance. I didn't see any consequences that would lead one to think that this character was apt to change or make any retribution to her victims. All I saw was a selfish user portrayed as a "cool" smooth talking role model. She is so self-righteous that she will not relent to forgiving her male accomplice for crimes identical to hers! Besides stealing, gender prejudice, coercion of minors and a gross manipulation of justice, I can't see how this Christmas story could inspire any better moral qualities. Sorry, not my idea of a heart warming story.

IKhan251980 I hate the attitude of the woman in the beginning of the movie. She calls the guy a jerk for sleeping on his bed by himself and making her and the kid sleep on the sofa bed- when she is the criminal here, not him, so she should deal with the consequences of her lifestyle. She also says something like "gotta make a living"- but she is a pick pocket, that is not making a living. She's just too lazy to get a real job, she wants the easy way out. Plus she trains the kid to steal as well. No sympathy for criminals- she should have been in jail. Oh and then to top it all off the idiot guy who's watching her apologizes for the things he said. He never should have, nor did he need to, apologize. Apologising just makes all her stealing OK.

Kat Miss "On the 2nd Day of Christmas" is absolute torture. It is the cinematic equivalent of coal in your stocking. Here is a movie so unpleasant and manipulative that you will have to take a cold shower just to remove the swarminess.I have never disliked a Christmas movie so much. It tries to shamelessly manipulate our feelings. This is the kind of movie that Roger Ebert would describe as "taking tears by liposuction". That's how desperate these filmmakers are to move us. Well, it moved me. Off the couch at the halfway point. I usually sit through an entire movie, no matter how bad. But an hour and 10 minutes of this tripe was more than I could bear.With a more organized and thoughtful screenplay, this could have been a good movie. But this script has several fatal flaws. First, there are no sympathetic or likable characters. When by the twenty minute mark, you want to throw your female lead out the window, you know you're in trouble. Second, the film is overly predictable. We know what's going to happen and sure enough, I successfully predicted everything that happened after the opening ten minutes. Third, the performances feel by the numbers. There's no life or flavor, just routine unpleasantness.Do yourself a favor. Instead of wasting two hours of your life, read a book, do a jigsaw puzzle, go out for a walk. Just don't watch this movie. zero stars (out of four)