Grade: A-

Verdict: Can make your heart grow three sizes — if you're not laughing too hard.

Details: Starring Jim Carrey, Christine Baranski and Kelley the dog. Directed by Ron Howard. Rated PG for some crude humor. One hour, 42 minutes.

Rate it: Write your own review

Review: Before he gets serious about crushing Whoville's holiday cheer, the Grinch (Jim Carrey) contents himself with car vandalism and mail pranks. Nothing dampens the yuletide spirit like a jury summons or an eviction notice. Hearing the Whos caroling in the valley below Mount Crumpit, the green grump snarls, “It's joyful and triumphant.”

But the main event in “Dr. Seuss' How the Grinch Stole Christmas” is when Mr. Green gets really mean: The furry misanthrope snatches every candy cane, can of Who-Hash, tender roast beast and even the sugarplums from the dreams of sleeping Who-Kids.

While this remains the centerpiece of Ron Howard's delightful live-action version of the Dr. Seuss tale, the rest of the movie is equally stuffed with high spirits and barbed wit. The big-budget production fills the screen with lots of eye candy and clever special effects. But it's Carrey, unrecognizable beneath Rick Baker's layered makeup, who gives the movie its memorably wicked mix of naughty and nice. A blend of Boris Karloff, Richard Nixon and W.C. Fields, he's a sleigh-riding Scrooge with a self-aware wit.

Finding a child impervious to his taunts, the Grinch bemoans, “Kids today — so desensitized by movies and television.” When a taxi speeds past him in the snow, he shouts, “It's because I'm green, isn't it?” And when he finds himself speaking some Seussian verse, he stops cold with the horrified realization that he's talking in rhyme.

Even beneath the inches of latex, Carrey puts through an expressive performance. Only true Grinches in the audience won't be melted by his Christmas-morning transformation from snake to softy.

Adapted by screenwriters Jeffrey Price and Peter S. Seaman, “The Grinch” swipes some beloved bits (and two songs) from the 1966 animated version. It also expands the source material in a way that honors the satiric but sweet tone of Theodor S. Geisel (aka Dr. Seuss).

In other words, this “Grinch” explains why our anti-hero's heart is two sizes too small, why he lives in his Rube Goldberg-style lair high atop Mount Crumpit, and just exactly what makes him mad enough one Christmas Eve to strap an antler on the head of his long-suffering dog, Max (the talented Kelley), and become an evil Crank Kringle.

The additions also give a front-and-center role to Cindy Lou Who (Taylor Momsen). Now more than just the tyke who stumbles on Grinchy Claus stuffing her family's tree up the flue, she's a tiny yule do-gooder who wants to reintroduce the smelly loner into polite Who society. After all, she points out, Christmas is the time when everyone should be together.

Howard directs the movie with the right balance of broad energy and smart detail. He gives kids plenty of “Home Alone”-style slapstick, but also some devious snippets of humor for adult viewers. (Who knew the swingin' Who adults had key parties?) We also get a couple of movie parodies, including a tweak of action films (as the Grinch runs in slow motion to escape a vehicle about to explode) and a tart use of the “Chariots of Fire” theme.

Michael Corenblith's production design realizes the Morocco-meets-Gaudi curves of Whoville and the Grinch's junkyard cavern. Rita Ryack's costumes have the right lavish whimsy (hats of saucers trimmed with milk and cookies). Baker's makeup gives all the Whos amusing snouts and buck teeth; they look like fleshy-faced badgers. And the computer-generated backgrounds are thoughtfully done; even the clouds have Seussian curlicues.

The supporting cast includes slinky Christine Baranski as Martha May Whovier, a refined leading citizen of Whoville with a surprising taste in men. Young Momsen is a charmer who doesn't get cloying, though in one of the movie's few missteps, she has to sing a not-very-good song about losing the joy of Christmas. Josh Ryan Evans plays the 8-year-old Grinch with a malicious gusto matched with genuine vulnerability. Anthony Hopkins handles the narration, though nobody can beat Karloff's basso growl.

“How the Grinch Stole Christmas” isn't exactly a great work of art. But it honors a holiday classic while introducing canny improvements to the original. Even better, it's the rare holiday movie that manages to entertain the kid in all of us, without forgetting that grownups love the Grinch, too. Whether he wants us to or not.

— Steve Murray, Cox News Service