How the Grinch Stole Christmas (film)

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.

"The presents! They'll be destroyed! And I care! What is the deal?!"

—The Grinch

A 2000 film based upon the book of the same name, starring Jim Carrey as The Grinch. While it still follows upon the original book, it featured an additional backstory. To date, it is the second highest-grossing Christmas film of all time, next to Home Alone.

Tropes used in How the Grinch Stole Christmas (film) include:
  • Accidental Pervert: The title character at one point winds up flying face-first into the bosom of his childhood crush. Without removing his head from her chest, he quickly greets her with the words, "Hello, Martha."
  • Adaptation Expansion: At the same time, the movie expands on the Grinch's character, actually creating legitimate motivation for his actions and a reason why he did what he did this particular Christmas, in comparison to the original story where he simply hated Christmas and randomly decided that, after 53 years of putting up with it, to ruin it. Namely, he was rejected by the Whos as a child, is disgusted with their materialism including the garbage they keep dumping at his home and Cindy Lou's attempt to help ends with him being publicly humiliated.
  • Adaptational Villainy: Until the ending, the Whos are really less sympathetic than in the book.
  • Adults Are Useless: After all, for most of the film the smartest character is a six-year-old girl.
  • Affably Evil: Mayor Augustus Maywho.
  • Affectionate Parody: A subversion of sorts. The Grinch starts to realize he's speaking in rhyme at certain points and goes out of his way to try and prevent it.
  • Alternative Character Interpretation: The Grinch's backstory provides one.
  • Anti-Villain: Grinch is a Type II, while Max is a Type I or a Type IV.
  • Aside Glance: The Grinch, a few times.
  • Award Bait Song: "Where Are You, Christmas?"
  • Bad Santa: The Grinch disguises himself as one.
  • Beast and Beauty: The Grinch and Martha May Whovier.
  • Berserk Button: The Grinch actually seems to enjoy being involved in the Christmas celebrations... until he opens his gift to find a razor, which triggers his deep-seated childhood rage, increased when Augustus proposes to Martha right in front of him.
  • Bill, Bill, Junk, Bill: The Grinch does this in reverse to the Whos, sending unpleasant mail to random destinations in the post office: "Jury duty! Jury duty! Jury duty! Blackmail! Pink slip! Chain letter! Eviction notice!"
    • Also flips through the town phone book at random, loudly voicing his displeasure with each name he reads. "Hate, hate, hatehatehatehate, double-hate, LOATHE ENTIRELY!!"
  • Breath Weapon: While wandering Whoville incognito, The Grinch knocks out a pushy hat salesman with his foul breath.
  • Callousness Towards Emergency
  • Cheshire Cat Grin: When the Grinch gets his awful idea.
  • Chewing the Scenery: Jim Carrey takes it a little too far when he eats a wine bottle.
  • Crap Saccharine World: A light example. While Whoville seems like a festive, friendly place at first, the Grinch points out that most of the inhabitants are interested in Christmas for greedy or competitive reasons.
  • Darker and Edgier
  • Delivery Stork
  • Devil in Plain Sight: Mayor Augustus Maywho.
  • Enfant Terrible: The grinch when he was a kid.
  • Even Evil Has Standards: While the Grinch is not above destroying public property and anything Christmas related, he at least avoids running women pushing children on the stroller. Even if the end result ends with his little car exploding.
    • To be more precise he'll cause a little chaos and mayhem, but he avoids people getting hurt. After Max get's the Grinch's attention that Cindy's in real danger at from the machinery he reluctantly saves her.

Grinch: "Bleeding hearts of the world unite!"

  • Excited Show Title!: Averted. Unlike the original book and the animated short, this version leaves the exclamation point out of the title.
  • Fantastic Racism: The Mayor against the Grinch.
  • Flashback
  • Freudian Excuse: The Grinch is given one that previous versions lacked.
  • Funbag Airbag: "Hello, Martha." Coupled with Crash Into Hello.
  • Funny Answering Machine: "If you utter so much as one syllable, I'LL HUNT YOU DOWN AND GUT YOU LIKE A FISH! If you'd like to fax me, press the star key."
  • G-Rated Sex: The "baby Whos from the sky" method of reproduction.
  • Gadgeteer Genius: The Grinch.
  • Genius Bruiser: The Grinch.
  • Getting Crap Past the Radar
    • The flashback to the baby Grinch being delivered appears to take place at a key party.
    • "...He looks just like your boss."
  • Grim Up North: The Grinch lives "just north of Whoville", and his lair is pretty icy (although that may just be because it's winter.)
  • The Grinch
  • Hannibal Lecture: The Grinch delivers a truly epic one to the partygoers at the Whobilation ceremony.
  • He Was Not My Boyfriend: Cindy Lou's interview of Martha May opens with Martha May flatly denying ever having had a crush on the Grinch, to which a confused Cindy replies, "I didn't ask you that."
  • Horrible Judge of Character: Cindy Lou.
  • Interactive Narrator: The Grinch shushes the narrator when he's sneaking into the Whos' houses to steal their presents.
  • Intergenerational Friendship: Eventually The Grinch and Cindy Lou.
  • Jerkass: The Grinch and Mayor Augustus Maywho.
  • Large Ham: Jim Carrey as the Grinch... expected as it is, well, Jim Carrey.
  • Live Action Adaptation: Obviously.
  • Love Makes You Evil: The Grinch's backstory.
  • Love Triangle: The Grinch, Mayor Augustus Maywho and Martha May Whovier.
  • Masquerade Maintenance: As a child, the Grinch tries to shave off his green hair after being teased about it. It doesn't work very well.
  • Mood Whiplash: While obviously a comedy through and through, there are quite a few scenes foreign to the genre, like the "Where Are You, Christmas?" song.
    • The Whobiliation scene qualifies by the moment the Grinch gets the razor as a gift.
  • Morality Pet: A literal version! Max doesn't let the Grinch leave the Post Office without saving Cindy Lou.
  • Murder the Hypotenuse: While not actually involving literal murder, Augustus Maywho tries to get rid of the Grinch and the Grinch takes extra care in ruining Maywho's life when terrorizing the Whos.
  • Mythology Gag: The opening shot depicting Whoville as being inside a snowflake is a shout out to Horton Hears a Who!, where Whoville is located in a similarly microscopic speck of dust.
    • Fridge Brilliance! Who's to say that it's not the same speck, but stuck on a snowflake? It would explain why Whoville can have both warm and snowy weather. Plus in Seussical, the Grinch makes a cameo in the speck of dust Horton finds.
    • Many designs (including but not limited to the clouds over Whoville) are based on swirls and spirals, echoing design elements in the original book.
  • Narrator: Anthony Hopkins.
  • Non-Human Sidekick: Max the Dog.
  • Opposites Attract Revenge: The Grinch's girlfriend Martha almost marries Augustus Maywho, who bullied the Grinch as a child.
  • Packed Heroine: This happens to Cindy Lou Who.
  • Paper-Thin Disguise: This ugly cave creature puts on a red coat and Santa hat. Boom! He automatically looks "just like Saint Nick."
  • Parent Service: Whenever Martha May Whovier is on screen. (Er, in adult form, that is.)
  • Parental Bonus:
    • During the Grinch's childhood, in one scene the sisters can be seen collecting keys in a bowl, which could either be an alcohol reference or a sex joke.
    • Also shortly before that, when the Grinch and the other Who babies are arriving via stork, one new Who father asks his wife why their new son looks like her boss.
    • IT'S BECAUSE I'M GREEN, ISN'T IT?
  • Parental Obliviousness: Lou and Betty Lou Who. They never seem to question where Cindy Lou is when she's out looking for the Grinch.
    • Also applies to Cindy Lou's older brothers, Stu and Drew, whose warnings about running into the Grinch at the beginning of the film are ignored as well.
  • Parrot Expowhat: "Holiday Whobeewhatee?"
  • Saving Christmas: Inverted; in fact, the inversion of this trope is essentially the whole premise of the story. However, it's then played straight when the Grinch ends up Saving Christmas at the end.
  • Schoolyard Bully All Grown Up: Mayor Augustus Maywho.
  • Shout-Out: When working with Max on his reindeer impression, the Grinch wears a baseball cap deliberately modeled on one worn by and affects mannerisms often displayed by director Ron Howard.
  • Shrunken Organ: The Grinch's heart.
  • Spiritual Successor: 2003's live-action film of Dr. Seuss' The Cat in the Hat, from the same production company and with Mike Myers as the Cat. Incidentally, guess who voiced Horton in Blue Sky Studios' Horton Hears a Who! in 2008.
  • Timeshifted Actor[context?]
  • Together in Death: The Grinch comforts Cindy Lou as they plummet seemingly to their deaths so that they won't cry together on Christmas.
  • Unsympathetic Comedy Protagonist: The Grinch.
  • Up to Eleven: Inverted in the beginning as the Grinch's heart is two sizes smaller than what a normal one should be. Played straight By the end, as it's not only grown to a normal size, but one size farther!
  • V8 Engine Noises: While all Who cars seem to have tiny engines with, like, one cylinder, the small car the Grinch hijacks from a couple of small Whos sounds like it has a V8 under the hood (or grows one as soon as he guns the engine).
  • Villain Protagonist: The Grinch, up until the end.
  • "The Villain Sucks" Song: "You're a Mean One, Mr. Grinch". The stage and movie versions give it to the Grinch, making it a tongue-in-cheek Villain Song.
  • Who-man Focused Adaptation
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