The best/worst Pa. holiday film no one talks about

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Here's a look at the best images they produced.

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I was deep in my holiday movie binge earlier this month and approaching torpor when I came across a statistic that jolted my senses.

Cursory Google Trends research by CenturyLink had confirmed Home Alone 2: Lost in New York as Pennsylvania's favorite 90s holiday film.

While I prefer literally everything about the original, it could be worse: Wyoming went with Home Alone 3. 

Stepping outside of the 90s, just barely, more cursory Google Trends research identified (the possibly Marxist?) National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation — another John Hughes joint — as the overall favorite.

But there's another holiday flick — one set in Pennsylvania, though not filmed here — that rarely if ever appears on any top ten lists. 

It's called Trapped in Paradise and some people, mostly me, think it's good. An unconventional masterpiece? No. Underrated? Yes. 

Of course not everyone agrees, and Joe Ramoni of Almost Cult Classics called it "one of the most [critically] reviled films of 1994."

Roger Ebert said it "should be preserved by the Library of Congress, as an example of creative desperation," but that could mean anything.

He added: "It plays like a documentary about a group of actors forced to perform in a screenplay that contains not one single laugh, or moment of wit, or flash of intelligence, or reason for being."

OK, that's slightly more definitive. 

Variety's review at the time was also not enthusiastic but did call it "an agreeable Middle American comedy" and "undoubtedly the first movie in which a horsedrawn sleigh is chased by a cop car on Christmas Eve."

According to IMDB, the cast even hated making it.

Now come the positives. 

Something of an anti-Hallmark plot, the movie has criminally inclined brothers played by Nicolas Cage, Dana Carvey, and Jon Lovitz robbing a Pennsylvania bank on Christmas Eve — their greatest obstacles being the weather and the irrepressible kindness of the locals.

Cage does his crazy eyes thing, Florence Stanley chews up the scenery with hoarse one-liner after hoarse one-liner, and then there's Richard Jenkins as the apoplectic FBI agent who's had it with everyone.

While I'll admit an armed robbery makes for unusual holiday film fodder, it's worth noting that National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation ends with an aggravated kidnapping, and Home Alone is just Die Hard for kids.

Trapped in Paradise, by comparison, is essentially a 111-minute tourism commercial that makes Pennsylvania look like Mayberry-lite. 

There is a real Paradise, Pennsylvania, in Lancaster County.

I've been there but found no communal embrace of this claim to cinematic fame like one would in Erie or Indiana County.

If there's any sign of the movie (slowly) approaching cult classic status, it's this: The promotional materials now go for big money online. 

And while there are other Pennsylvania holiday movies — some actually made here — only one has Nick Cage and a horsedrawn police chase.

If you've seen Trapped in Paradise or get a chance to, let me know what you think (Team Ebert or Team Deppen?). Or just tell me what holiday films are on regular rotation at your house this year.

Now, if you'll excuse me, the couch and torpor are calling.

—Colin Deppen, PA Local editor 

Happy Hanukkah. Here's a menorah near Independence Hall, via The Inquirer's archive. Send us your photos or artwork, use #PAGems on Instagram, or tag us @spotlightpennsylvania.