A Mila Kunis Holiday Movie Is Killing It On Streaming
Mila Kunis's A Bad Moms Christmas is currently top 10 on Netflix.
‘Tis the season for watching holiday movies, even if they do star the voice of Meg on Family Guy. By now, you’ve probably been streaming holiday classics new and old. Now, a Mila Kunis movie named A Bad Moms Christmas has landed in the Netflix Top 10 for this week.
As the name of this film may indicate, this 2017 movie is actually a sequel to the 2016 film Bad Moms. The original film featured the titular bad moms bonding with each other and loosening up. Now, the sequel movie adds a holiday twist and brings in three stars from the original: Mila Kunis, Kristen Bell, and Kathryn Hahn.
However, this time, there’s a twist. While the original movie simply focused on the misadventures of Mila Kunis and the other “bad moms,” the sequel showcases these ladies as they deal with their own crazy mothers over the holiday season. Despite the streaming success of this movie, though, it got a decidedly mixed reception when it was first released.
For example, A Bad Moms Christmas has a dismal rating of 28% on Rotten Tomatoes. Most of the criticisms focused on how little plot the film has and how weird and raunchy it gets. Of course, “raunchy movie starring Mila Kunis” is all some viewers really want from a film, and her star power may help to explain the streaming success the movie, like another Kunis film on Netflix, has recently enjoyed.
In fact, it’s fair to say that this is a film that you’ll either love or hate based on the cast alone. In addition to Mila Kunis, this movie brings in Kathryn Hahn (perhaps best known these days for portraying the devious Agatha Harkness in Wandavision) and Kristen Bell (who has eternal “cool geek” status thanks to shows like Veronica Mars and The Good Place). And the ladies’ mothers are played by other beloved actors, including Susan Sarandon, Christine Baranski, and Cheryl Hines.
Despite being a critical dud, A Bad Moms Christmas was a modest financial success at the box office. This little Mila Kunis movie cost only $28 million to make but ended up making $130.6 million. The cost of marketing the movie likely cut into its profits, but a raunchy comedy earning almost five times its budget is quite impressive.
What’s unclear, though, is whether this movie is going to get its own sequel. The original Bad Moms cost less (only $20 million) and made more ($183.9 million worldwide). It was a no-brainer greenlighting another movie after Mila Kunis and others made the first a smash hit, but a sequel that made so much less despite a bigger budget likely gave the executives behind it some serious pause.
Still, the streaming success the movie is enjoying right now may prove there is still a viable market for raunchy holiday films (especially if they star the generous girl next door Mila Kunis). And, quite frankly, there are very few modern movies that we’d consider true Hollywood holiday hits. We could always use more great films to watch while vegging out on the couch this holiday season and having a plot that makes The Hangover movies look downright scholarly doesn’t matter once you start dipping into the eggnog!
