{"id":9970,"date":"2024-12-09T23:33:47","date_gmt":"2024-12-10T04:33:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/?p=9970"},"modified":"2024-12-09T23:33:47","modified_gmt":"2024-12-10T04:33:47","slug":"the-santa-clause-3-the-escape-clause","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/2024\/12\/09\/the-santa-clause-3-the-escape-clause\/","title":{"rendered":"The Santa Clause 3: The Escape Clause"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"The Santa Clause 3: The Escape Clause <\/strong>(2006) Disney\/Comedy-Fantasy\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 92 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated G (some comic violence)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Michael Lembeck\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Ed Decter and John J. Strauss\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: George S. Clinton\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Robbie Greenberg \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Release date: November 3, 2006 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Tim Allen, Martin Short, Elizabeth Mitchell, Judge Reinhold, Wendy Crewson, Ann-Margret, Eric Lloyd, Spencer Breslin, Liliana Mumy, Alan Arkin, Aisha Tyler, Peter Boyle, Art LaFleur, Kevin Pollak, Jay Thomas, Michael Dorn, Abigail Breslin.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Box Office: $84.5M (US)\/$110.7M (World)<\/p>\n

Rating:<\/strong> **<\/p>\n

\u00a0I didn\u2019t see The Santa Clause 3: The Escape Clause<\/strong> at the cinema. In fact, I didn\u2019t see it until a few years after its 2006 release. I never felt particularly compelled to watch it. When I finally did, I hated it. In my opinion, it lacked the charm and creativity of the first movie, a Christmas classic in many homes including mine. It was more appalling than appealing. I wrote a scathing review and figured I\u2019d leave it at that. Well, I didn\u2019t.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Maybe it\u2019s the masochist in me, but I decided to give The Santa Clause 3<\/strong> another go. I watched the first two movies the previous two nights and impulsively decided to complete the trilogy. A funny thing happened. I kind of liked it this time. Oh, it\u2019s the weakest of the three films alright. It\u2019s not as much fun as the others. Most of the time, it feels forced. The main players look bored with the whole thing. It\u2019s the cinematic equivalent of a stale Christmas cookie.<\/p>\n

\u00a0At the same time, I can\u2019t outright dismiss The Santa Clause 3<\/strong> as Christmas folly. It has to be Martin Short\u2019s campy performance as the film\u2019s antagonist Jack Frost. Somebody described him as \u201can evil cross between Liza Minnelli and Liberace\u201d. That\u2019s an accurate description. I could even see this character becoming a gay icon. He\u2019s that out there.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Directed once again by Michael Lembeck, The Santa Clause 3<\/strong> is basically a variation of It\u2019s a Wonderful Life. It would be a vast understatement to say Scott Calvin\/Santa Claus (Allen) has a lot on his plate this holiday season. Like a lot of folks, he\u2019s trying hard to balance family and career. He\u2019s behind on his work and for good reason; he\u2019s anxiously awaiting the birth of his first child with Mrs. Claus (Mitchell, Frequency). It could happen at any time.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Afraid that he won\u2019t be there when the time comes, Santa Scott invites the family to spend Christmas at the North Pole. In addition to his own family- ex-wife Laura (Crewson), her husband Neil (Reinhold) and their daughter Lucy (Mumy, Cheaper by the Dozen)- he also invites his in-laws, Bud (Arkin, Little Miss Sunshine) and Sylvia (Margaret, Viva Las Vegas). Now here\u2019s the rub. Her parents don\u2019t know he\u2019s Santa and he\u2019s not supposed to tell anybody outside his immediate family. What\u2019s a guy to do? He has the elves redo the North Pole to look like Canada. That ought to fool them.<\/p>\n

\u00a0In other news, it seems that Jack Frost is going around stirring up trouble. He\u2019s tired of being a supporting player in the Council of Legendary Figures (yep, the whole gang is back!). He wants recognition. Mother Nature (Tyler, Bedtime Stories) wants to suspend him, but Jack convinces her to let him do community service at the North Pole as Santa\u2019s helper. Naturally, he has ulterior motives. He wants to trick Santa Scott into invoking the \u201cEscape Clause\u201d which would enable him to take over as Father Christmas. All it takes is for Santa Scott to say “I wish I had never become Santa at all.” while holding a magic snow globe. Jack succeeds in his mission and Christmas becomes a nightmare as George Bailey…. er, Scott gets to see what things would be like if he didn\u2019t put on the red suit that fateful night in 1994. It isn\u2019t pretty. It\u2019s on Scott to figure out how to set things right again.<\/p>\n

\u00a0In the alternate reality where Scott didn\u2019t become Santa, Jack has turned the North Pole into a gaudy tourist trap where parents have to pay to put their kids on the nice list. Ever the showman, Jack performs a number called \u201cNorth Pole, North Pole\u201d replete with miserable-looking elf back-up dancers. It\u2019s one of the few times The Santa Clause 3<\/strong> comes to something resembling life. As hard as Lembeck tries, the movie has a lazy, half-assed feeling to it. Allen appears especially bored. Anyone can see he\u2019s just going through the motions this time. Eric Lloyd, who plays his son Charlie, is absent for most of it. Of course, he comes back at the end when his extended family needs him most. I wish I could say the same for David Krumholtz as head elf Bernard. He couldn\u2019t come back due to his commitment to his TV series Numb3rs. His absence is deeply felt.<\/p>\n

\u00a0The only one who looks like he\u2019s having any fun at all is Short. He takes devilish glee in playing a real meanie who will do anything to be as famous as his fellow LFs. His malicious behavior might upset a few smaller children, but is he any worse than any antagonist in any given classic Christmas special? Is sabotaging ops at the workshop any worse than attempting to steal Christmas? Okay, there is the scene where he freezes Lucy\u2019s parents after she threatens to blow the whistle on him. It might unsettle a few of the little ones, but it\u2019s nowhere near as traumatizing as the fate of Bambi\u2019s mother or Simba\u2019s father. In any event, Short\u2019s flamboyant villain is kind of fun.<\/p>\n

\u00a0It isn\u2019t just the overall indifference of the cast and crew that keeps The Santa Clause 3<\/strong> from flying high. The bad CGI increases the manufactured feel of the whole enterprise. I look at the scenes with the sleigh and reindeer and all I see is a bunch of computer jockeys tapping away at their keyboards. Where is the artistry in that? These effects aren\u2019t special at all. I much prefer what the Salkinds did in 1985\u2019s Santa Claus: The Movie. They made you believe a man in a sleigh could fly. Well, I believed it. I just didn\u2019t get that feeling from The Santa Clause 3<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

\u00a0I don\u2019t hate The Santa Clause 3<\/strong> in any way. I simply think they shouldn\u2019t have even bothered given the bored nature and forced feel of the whole movie. It\u2019s not a lot of fun and it won\u2019t delight children the same way the original movie did. It has one thing going for it and while it\u2019s campily fun for adults, I doubt the kiddies will respond the same way. This is one of those movies you put on hoping it will keep the rugrats occupied long enough for you to wrap presents.\"\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Santa Clause 3: The Escape Clause (2006) Disney\/Comedy-Fantasy\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 92 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated G (some comic violence)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Michael Lembeck\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Ed Decter and John J. Strauss\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: George S. Clinton\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Robbie Greenberg \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Release date: November 3, 2006 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Tim Allen, Martin Short, Elizabeth Mitchell, Judge Reinhold, Wendy Crewson, Ann-Margret, Eric Lloyd, Spencer […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":10008,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[18,12,15],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9970","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-comedies","category-holiday-movies","category-sequels-remakes"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/The-Santa-Clause-3-PIC.jpg?fit=620%2C348&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9970","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9970"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9970\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10010,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9970\/revisions\/10010"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10008"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9970"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9970"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9970"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}