It purports to be a Christmas movie for kids yet it opens with Santa and Mrs Claus freezing to death in a snowstorm. More traumatising than magical. The film as a whole suffers from a total inability to settle on a tone: is this the absurdist anti-capitalist satire John Lithgow acts like he’s in? The sad and occasionally traumatic movie of the scenes between Santa and Mrs Claus? The gentle comic tragedy Dudley Moore acts like he’s in? Or whatever the hell sort of Dickensian hellscape the child actors think they’re in? It’s like 5 different movies all happening at the same time and only occasionally interacting with one another. How this has become a Christmas classic is beyond me.
Rank 86
Santa Claus: The Movie
Added 25 December 2024