Arthur Christmas (2011) Columbia/Comedy-Adventure RT: 97 minutes Rated PG (some mild rude humor) Director: Sarah Smith Screenplay: Peter Baynham Music: Harry Gregson-Williams Cinematography: Jericca Cleland Release date: November 23, 2011 (US) Cast: James McAvoy, Hugh Laurie, Bill Nighy, Jim Broadbent, Imelda Staunton, Ashley Jensen, Marc Wootton, Laura Linney, Eva Longoria, Ramona Marquez, Michael Palin. Box Office: $46.4M (US)/$147.4M (World)
Rating: ***
I must have been in some kind of mood when I originally reviewed Arthur Christmas back in 2011. I gave it a negative review describing it as “mediocre and unremarkable” and “more likely to make your head throb than your heart soar”. I guess I just wasn’t in the holiday spirit that year.
The good thing about my profession is that it allows me a significant amount of latitude. I can always go back and rewatch an older movie to see if my opinion has changed any. In some cases, it’s merited. Other times, it’s a “why not” situation. That’s where I’d put the computer-animated Christmas comedy Arthur Christmas, a co-production of Aardman Animations, the British studio that gave the world Wallace & Gromit and Shaun the Sheep. I came across my old review while going through the Movie Guy 24/7 archives. I remembered almost nothing about it so I decided to give it another go. This time, I liked it. That is to say, I liked it better than I did before. Not seeing it in 3D helped a great deal, I’m sure.
According to Arthur Christmas, everything we think we know about Santa Claus and his operation at the North Pole is incorrect. The old sleigh (covered with lead-based paint) and eight reindeer were retired sometime in the 60s after a sighting of it during the Cuban Missile Crisis nearly started WWIII. It’s been replaced by the S-1, a huge high-tech vessel with a dark, star-filled sky painted on the bottom. It’s operated with military-like precision by elves who zip down ropes and enter houses in any way possible to deliver the presents. Santa’s workshop at the North Pole is more like Mission Control at NASA with a team of elves tracking Santa’s journey on computer monitors.
Here’s another startling Santa fact. He’s just a figurehead, the face of Christmas. The one really running the show is his son Steve (Laurie, Stuart Little 1 & 2), a strapping fellow who resembles a GI Joe action figure. He’s next in line to inherit the title of Santa Claus. You see, Santa isn’t an immortal being. It’s a job handed down through the generations of the Claus family. The current title holder Malcolm Claus (Broadbent, Paddington 1-3) is set to retire after this year’s Christmas Eve run. That is, if a terrible mistake doesn’t undo the entire operation.
One of the elves, Bryony (Jensen, How to Train Your Dragon), finds an undelivered present. Steve dismisses it as an acceptable error. What’s one child missed out of billions? Younger brother Arthur (McAvoy, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe), a well-meaning but clumsy sort in charge of answering children’s letters to Santa, vehemently disagrees. He believes every child should have a present to open on Christmas morning. He takes it on himself to deliver the present to the recipient, a little girl in the UK, with help from his grandfather (Nighy, Love Actually), the previous holder of the Santa title. It’s going to be tight with only a couple of hours until sunrise and the old sleigh as their means of transport.
Directed by Sarah Smith (Ron’s Gone Wrong), Arthur Christmas is a clever little animated movie that should appeal to grade schoolers old enough to appreciate alternate theories about Santa Claus. I like how it presents the Claus family as a somewhat dysfunctional bunch. Santa and his mildly senile 136YO dad have a hard time communicating. Steve and Arthur don’t get along. It’s a typical big brother-little brother relationship. Steve, a bossy take-charge type, thinks Arthur, a good-natured soul who usually ends up making a mess of things, is a pain. Mom (Staunton, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix) smiles a lot and dispenses words of wisdom as needed.
The problem with Arthur Christmas is that it tends to sputter and stall once it’s airborne. Arthur and company keep going to the wrong place. It turns out there’s more than one Trelew in the world. Everywhere they go, trouble follows. It becomes redundant after a while. Meanwhile back at the North Pole, news of the situation finally reaches a sleeping Santa despite Steve’s best efforts to keep a lid on it. Determined to help his second-born resolve the issue, he and his wife borrow the S-1. That’s when Arthur Christmas regains its footing.
Arthur Christmas boasts a pretty good voice cast, a virtual who’s who of British cinema. They all do a respectable job in their roles. Broadbent and Staunton are perfect as Mr. and Mrs. Claus. Laurie is pretty good as the brother/son with a military mentality. McAvoy is very good as Arthur, a nice guy with a fear of flying. Yeah, I forgot to mention that bit of info. It makes his mission all the more difficult.
Arthur Christmas looks good. The animation is spot-on. It’s colorful and vibrant with some really cool images. It gets too busy for its own good at times, but it’s less overwhelming in 2D. Unsurprisingly, it made more money overseas than it did domestically. It has a markedly British sensibility which doesn’t always work with American audiences. Smaller children might not know what to make of it, but some of the older ones will probably get it. Either way, it’s a decent choice for one of the nights before Christmas. It’s definitely better than watching Jim Carrey as the Grinch for the 250th time.
